Tigers go up early but lose big, 9-2 against Saskatoon

By MEDICINE HAT NEWS on January 22, 2022.

The Medicine Hat Tigers mini Saskatchewan road trip got off on the wrong foot Friday night.

The Tigers led 2-0 early and outshot Saskatoon in the game but gave up nine unanswered goals to fall 9-2 to the Blades.

Medicine Hat’s newest player, Logan Barlage, scored in his Tigers debut 3:24 into the contest. Barlage, alongside a 2022 fourth-round pick, was acquired by the Tabbies in the deal that sent Corson Hopwo to the Lethbridge Hurricanes ahead of Monday’s Western Hockey League trade deadline.

Carter Chorney and Owen MacNeil had the assists on Barlage’s eighth goal of the season. Only 1:02 later, Oasiz Wiesblatt knocked home a tic-tac-toe play on a Tigers power play to put them ahead 2-0 in the game’s first six minutes.

Teague Patton and Tyler MacKenzie had the assists on Wiesblatt’s fifth of the campaign.

The rest of the game was solely in the Blades’ hands, and they went on a nine-goal run to handily pick up their 20th win of the season. They sit second in the East Division with a record of 20-14-1-1.

Tristan Robins, Jayden Wiens and Kyren Gronick all scored for Saskatoon in the first period as the Blades took the 3-2 lead into the intermission.

Friday night’s contest marked the return to Saskatoon for Tigers Brendan Lee and Pasha Bocharov, who were traded to Medicine Hat on Dec. 28 in the three-team trade that involved the Prince George Cougars. The night also marked Tigers captain Daniel Bakers’ 200th career WHL game. The defenceman has played all 200 donning the orange and black.

Rhett Rhinehart scored two goals in the second period for the Blades as Robins also scored his second of the contest to give Saskatoon a 6-2 lead heading into the final 20 minutes.

Wiens jumped out early in the third for his second of the game that was followed up 12 minutes later with Gronick’s second.

Both Blades goals scored early in the third were on the power play, as Saskatoon dominated special teams. Four of their nine goals came on the power play and two came while the Blades were shorthanded.

To add insult to injury for the Tigers in an already big loss, former Tiger Ryan Nolan, who was sent to Saskatoon in the Lee/Bocharov trade, scored his first WHL goal to cap off the Blades 9-2 victory.

Garin Bjorklund started for the Tigers and stopped 10 of the 16 shots he faced before Beckett Langkow took over the crease. Langkow stopped five of the eight shots he faced in the loss.

Across the ice, Ethan Chadwick turned aside 28 of the 30 Tigers shots he faced to pick up his third win on the season.

After Friday’s loss, the Tigers have now dropped four in a row and remain last in the Central Division and WHL standings with a record of 7-25-3-1.

The Tigers continue their road trip Saturday night as they head to Prince Albert to do battle with the Raiders. That game gets underway at 7 p.m. local time.

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