The Yorkton Terriers remain atop the Saskatchewan Junior Hockey League’s Viterra Division, with a pair of wins this past week helping their cause.
The Terriers have an 8-5-1 record for 17 points, three up on second place Estevan and six up on third place Weyburn. Melville is in the basement of the Viterra with eight points.
The week’s work included a weekend swing north to play a pair in Flin Flon. The goals came often at the Whitney Forum, home of the Bombers.
On Friday, Nate Cooper started the festivities with a goal 5:46 in for the host Bombers, but a pair of goals by Jared Legien sent the teams to the dressing rooms with Yorkton ahead 2-1 after 20 minutes.
The second period was all home team, as Dawson McKenzie started a six-goal deluge 1:59 into the frame. Daylan Marchi, Vincent Nardone, Caleb Franklin, and Brandson Hein with a pair also scored for the Bombers.
The Terriers did rally in the third on goals by Cody Bruchkowski, Dino Antoniadis and Cody Dubas, but would come up short in a 7-5 loss.
Ben Laidlaw started in the Terrier net taking the loss in giving up six goals in 20 shots, before being relieved by Ryan Ouellette.
Jacob Delorme had the Bomber win facing 28 shots.
The two teams went back at Saturday, with the Bombers starting things with a pair of unanswered first period goals from Hein and McKenzie, both coming on the powerplay.
In the second the teams traded singles, Legien putting the Terriers on the board early and Marchi scoring late for Flin Flon.
In the third it would be the Terrier offence that would have a big 20 minutes as Bruchkowski scored a pair of powerplay goals and Mason Mullaney and Quinten Hobbs added singles for a 5-3 lead before Hein added his second powerplay effort of the game to make it a 5-4 final.
Ouellette earned the win for Yorkton facing 30-shots, while Jeremy Dutcawich faced 45 in the loss for Flin Flon.
Yorkton head coach Mat Hehr said in spite of Friday’s loss the weekend was a good one.
“It was a tough game Friday, but we had a good bounce back Saturday,” he said.
The comeback effort actually started after the second period Friday when nothing went the Terriers’ way.
“It was just one of those spans of about nine-minutes where everything they shot went in,” said Hehr in reference to the Bombers second period Friday.
Hehr said sometimes when things just go so wrong it’s easier to get past them, adding the Terriers responded with a solid third, dragging themselves to a 7-5 score before some penalties hurt their comeback bid.
Hehr said the Terriers are certainly showing greater resiliency this season, a situation he credits to his returning players having learned from last season’s losses, and the arrival of key 20-year-olds who “bring a calmness to the dressing room.”
It helps that the Terrier offence is rolling. The Terriers have scored 61 goals this season, second only to Flin Flon (with 72) and the Bombers (who have scored two more games).
The Terriers also have three players in the top-10 in scoring, including Jared Legien who is second with 26 points, four back of Bomber Brandson Hein. Branden Klatt sits in a three way tie with 21, and Aiden Bulych, the only rookie in the top-10, has 20.
“We have all four lines scoring right now,” said Hehr. “… It’s not just one line doing it all.”
Wednesday win
Notre Dame visited the Farrell Agencies Arena last Wednesday where the teams traded first period goals. Tanner Tarbell opened the scoring for the visiting Hounds, with Jared Legien knotting the score with a powerplay marker.
In the second period it was a Hound goal sandwich as Jared Hamm scored for Notre Dame between Terrier markers by Branden Klatt and Chantz Petruic.
In the third the Hounds pulled ahead as Noah Bankowski tied the game 3-2 and Hamm used the powerplay to net the go-ahead marker at 9:04.
Terrier Brendan Mark would tie the game 4-4 with a goal at 16:41, and then with only nine-seconds left on the game clock Benjamin Solomon would pot the winner for Yorkton.
Ben Laidlaw earned the win in the Terrier net facing 41-shots, while Andrew Henderson took the loss for the Hounds facing 37.
Up next
The Terriers have a week to prepare for their next game, a make-up tilt in Melville Saturday.
Hehr said after giving the team a couple of days off, they will spend Wednesday to Friday working on the details of the game, in particular the penalty kill which gave up four goals Saturday in Flin Flon.
