NEWS PHOTO JAMES TUBB
Medicine Hat Tigers net minder Beckett Langkow eyes up a shot from his former teammate Corson Hopwo in the first period of the Tigers 2-1 losss to the Lethbridge Hurricanes Saturday night at Co-op Place.
The Medicine Hat Tigers are still looking for that first win against the Lethbridge Hurricanes this season.
The Tigers almost came back from a two goal deficit Saturday night but ultimately fell 2-1 to the Hurricanes for the fifth time this campaign.
Medicine Hat head coach Willie Desjardins said he thought the Tigers played hard in the loss but just aren’t getting breaks offensively.
“We’re not getting a lot of breaks but you have to make your own breaks,” Desjardins said. “It’s a little bit frustrating at times. I thought as a group though we played hard and could’ve gotten a better fate tonight.
The Tigers game into Saturday night’s loss, their sixth in a row, on the heels of a 7-2 beat down in Swift Current Friday night against the Broncos.
Besides the game being another rendition of the WHL’s highway three rivalry, Saturday night had special meaning for players on both teams. Tigers forward Logan Barlage faced Lethbridge for the first time since being traded to Medicine Hat at the WHL’s Jan. 17 trade deadline.
Barlage said there was lots of excitement at the start of the game facing the Hurricanes.
“I had to calm myself down a bit at the start but I thought we played pretty good D in the game,” Barlage said. “I thought we had a couple bad bounces and we didn’t get enough bounces our way.”
Saturday night was also the return for Corson Hopwo to Medicine Hat, who went the other way in the Barlage deal. Hopwo played 170 games in the orange and black over five seasons.
The 20-year-old former Tiger said it was a return full of emotions.
“Just nervous and exciting, just a lot of full emotions,” Hopwo said. “I thought it was pretty good.”
The Tigers appeared to open the scoring in the first three minutes of the game when Teague Patton knocked a puck lose from under Hurricane net minder Jared Picklyk into the net. The goal was soon waved off because the puck was under Pikclyk’s pad.
Over seven minutes passed as the Tigers tried to re-gain the momentum lost with the waived off goal when Lethbridge struck.
Yegor Klavdiev scored for the Hurricanes 11:17 into the game to give them a 1-0 lead. The Hurricanes doubled down on their lead five minutes later when Jett Jones knocked a loose puck past net minder Becket Langkow from out of mid-air.
The goal was reviewed but was deemed a good goal to give the Hurricanes a 2-0 lead after 20 minutes.
Besides three power play opportunities for the Tigers that passed with no offense, it was a quiet second period. Medicine Hat had multiple opportunities in the second that just missed the net by inches or were gobbled up by Picklyk. The Tigers out shot Lethbridge 7-6 in the second but still trailed 2-0 after 40 minutes.
After almost 25 minutes without a goal, the crowd of 2,170 Tigers faithful were rewarded early in the third.
Tabbies forward Brayden Boehm picked up a pass in the neutral zone and sped past the Hurricanes defenders before out waiting and sending a backhanded shot over Picklyk. Dru Krebs and Barlage picked p the assists on Boehm’s sixth goal of the season as the Tigers only trailed by one early in the third.
Boehm said it was nice to score and show off his speed but said it’s something he needs to do more of. Tigers
Langkow kept it that way minutes later as he turned aside a Hurricanes breakaway opportunity, maintaining the one goal deficit.
Hopwo almost scored against his former club late in the third but the Tigers net was pushed off its moorings and it was immediately waived off.
Hopwo said it was tough not seeing the chance go in against the Tigers especially because he’s still chasing his first goal as a Hurricane.
Despite a late push with the net empty, Medicine Hat could not complete the comeback as the Hurricanes held on for the 2-1 win.
When asked how they approach the lack of offence ahead of their next couple games, Desjardins said it’s about finding a way by getting pucks on net.
“Guys have to find a way, lots of times you just have to get the ugly goal sometimes too,” Desjardins said. “It can’t always be the pretty one. When things aren’t going you have to make sure pucks go to the net and you have to go in after it.”
Picklyk turned aside 20 of the21 shots he faced to help Lethbridge pickup a much needed two points as they are holding onto the last wildcard position in the Eastern Conference with a record of 20-22-2-1.
Across the ice, Langkow kept out 23 of the 25 shots he faced as the Tigers record on the year falls to 9-32-3-1.
Langkow said he thought he was pretty good in his 20th game of the season.
“There wasn’t a ton of shots but I thought I was good when I needed to be,” Langkow said. “Especially kind of late in the game, in the third they had that breakaway that I thought was huge to get the save to give us a chance. A couple bounces the other way it could be a different game.”
The Tigers are back in action Monday afternoon, when they host the Prince Albert Raiders for an 2 p.m. Family Day matinee at Co-op Place.
Desjardins said his biggest takeaway from the loss was that the Tigers played hard and didn’t quit. He said it’s hard for the Tigers to not being able to find ways to win especially at home in-front of their fans.
“The biggest thing is you don’t quit, you always come to play and you play hard,” Desjardins said. “It takes a lot, it’s not easy, it’s hard when they talk about people where things don’t go right and they keep doing it but lots of times it’s behind closed doors, ours is in front of people. It’s hard when you go out there and you don’t find ways to win.”
“We want to win at home, our fans are important to us, this building is important to us we have a long history here and we don’t take losing easy.”
