Tigers stun ‘Canes with OT comeback

By Ryan McCracken on October 20, 2018.

rmccracken@medicinehatnews.com @MHNMcCracken

Ryan Jevne pulled out the heroics on Friday night at the Canalta Centre.

The 20-year-old Medicine Hat Tigers winger scored with 54.3 seconds left in regulation to force overtime and set the stage for James Hamblin’s 4-3 game-winner after trailing the Lethbridge Hurricanes by a pair in the final two minutes of the third.

“At that point in the game all that’s on your mind is just finding a way to score because the team needs it,” said Jevne, who put up two points in the final two minutes of regulation. “Sometimes you go in and you get lucky bounces, so you’ve just got to throw pucks toward the net and make sure you don’t make any mistakes.”

The Hurricanes looked poised to escape with a victory when Tyler Preziuso was nabbed for slashing early in overtime, but the Tigers killed off the infraction and Hamblin scored on a penalty shot with 52 seconds left in sudden death.

“I was super nervous,” said Hamblin. “I was having a little trouble in practice scoring on the shootouts but I’m happy I could pull through.”

“He has one move, but he pulled something different today and it worked,” added Jevne.

Lethbridge seized control of the early action and didn’t give up their stranglehold on the momentum until well into the second period.

Noah Boyko broke through Tigers goaltender Mads S¿gaard’s defences on a fortuitous bounce nine minutes into the opening frame. After throwing a puck on goal, Boyko watched as his shot rode up Daniel Baker’s stick and over S¿gaard’s shoulder for his second of the year.

“We didn’t really give them much. We had a good forecheck and didn’t really give them an opportunity to make anything happen,” said Hurricanes captain Jordy Bellerive. “We’re the ones who deserved that one. They got a couple lucky bounces that changed the game.”

Jadon Joseph kept things rolling for Lethbridge in the dying minutes of the opening frame when he beat S¿gaard for his third of the year just after a high-sticking penalty to Jaxon Steele had expired. The marker sent Medicine Hat into the break nursing a two-goal deficit while managing just a single shot on goal.

“One shot in any league isn’t good, especially not this league,” said Hamblin. “We really came back. We just took it five minutes at a time, tried beating them every five minutes and it worked.”

The Tigers came to the ice with a better effort in the second period — out-chancing their opponents 9-6 in the frame — but Lethbridge goaltender Reece Klassen refused to budge and the ‘Canes carried their two-goal lead into the third.

Medicine Hat continued to chip away early in the third and Linus Nassen finally put one behind Klassen when he stepped into a slapshot just over two minutes into the frame.

“It didn’t look like we really had much business being in the game for a while. I thought Mads played solid in the first and kept it close,” said Tigers head coach Shaun Clouston. “We had a lot of blocked shots tonight, we had guys battling and defending hard. It was a combination of the goaltender keeping us in it and us just staying the course and believing.”

While the goal brought the crowd of 3,080 to its feet and sparked life on the Tigers bench, Dylan Cozens re-established Lethbridge’s two-goal lead on a fancy backhand deke with nine minutes remaining in regulation.

Preziuso kept Medicine Hat’s hope alive when he shoveled a set-up from Jevne past Klassen with less than two minutes left — pushing his point streak to three games with six points in the span —then Jevne erased the deficit on a hard shot from the right circle with just 54.3 seconds left on the clock to force overtime and set up Hamblin’s penalty shot winner.

“It was an unbelievable shot,” said Clouston. “It was right up there with a ton of velocity on it. That’s what you need. In those scenarios and situations we need guys like Ryan to step up and he did.”

S¿gaard turned away 26 shots to lock up the victory and push Medicine Hat to 6-5-0-1 on the season.

Klassen stopped 20 in the setback, dropping Lethbridge to 4-4-1-2.

The Tigers and Hurricanes go back at it Saturday in Lethbridge at 7 p.m.

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