Wings Fall in Weekend Opener

A rough start for the Weyburn Red Wings put them in a hole they could never climb out of and they ultimately fell 5–2 to their Highway 39 rivals on Friday night. Three first period goals put the Bruins ahead early and they never looked back in game one of their weekend home-and-home series.

Following a lengthy pre-game ceremony where the players parents and billets were honoured, it appeared to take the Red Wings a little while to get their legs under them. T.J. Irey scored the games first goal just 41 seconds in.

It was a near wire-to-wire win for Estevan, as the Red Wings four-game winning streak suddenly seems like a distant memory.

"We got outplayed, outworked, outshot, outchanced — we didn't do a lot of things well tonight. We got away from establishing a forecheck and playing physical. We weren't communicating or playing on the right side of the puck, it seems like we've slipped back to our old ways a bit," head coach Kyle Haines said. "It's frusturating but there's still time to correct it and win some hockey games."

Estevan jumped out to a 3–0 lead before Wings d-man Eric Soar scored his first of the game with just 2.7 seconds to go in the opening period. The Bruins scored just 22 seconds into period two, before Soar sniped home his second on the night to cut the lead to 4–2.

Weyburn had their opportunities to claw back and make a game of it, but could not capitalize with the specialty teams. A full two minute 5-on-3 pwoerplay and an extended five minute powerplay did not result in any goals or really any great scoring chances. In fact, the lone goal during those man advantages went to Estevan's Michael McChesney, who made no mistake on the shorthanded breakaway.

The usually potent Red Wings powerplay was ice cold at the most important times and it cost them. They finished 2–11 on the night with the man advantage.

"Those were huge opportunities that gave us a chance to comeback and we didn't dial up the urgency at all. We thought it would come easy and we just couldn't find the net. We weren't getting pucks through and we weren't creating lanes or getting traffic," Haines said. "It's tough to score goals when you aren't doing the little things right. We've lost track of the details a bit and we need to get back to them"

A scary incident took place in the first period when forward Jacob Piller was on the receiving a nasty headshot from Austin King-Cunningham. He was taken to hospital shortly after but the diagnosis didn't sound good. 

"I feel so bad for Jacob, he's been really good for us most of the year and to see him go down like that and lay still is scary. I know his family is in the stands and I feel for them, you never want to see a kid go through that and I hope he's okay," the Wings coach said. "But it was a vicious play by their player. We watched the video and he cross-checked him right in the head. It was a non-sensical play." 

There was some good news from the game. The Red Wings were sporting slick alternate jerseys that were auctioned off during the game. All proceeds were donated to the Saskatchewan Make-A-Wish Foundation. Burke Johnstone had the highest selling jersey at just over $2,000. In total, over $13,000 was raised for the inititative. 

Back on the ice, the Wings and Bruins will do it again tonight, with pcuk drop from Affinity Place set for 7:30. You can hear all the action live on BIG106 with the pre-game show starting at 7:20.