Cubs sweep series with Coaldale, move onto South finals

By James Tubb on February 23, 2022.

The Medicine Hat Cubs are onto the next round.

The Cubs beat the Coaldale Copperheads 3-2 Wednesday night in Coaldale to take their second round series with four straight wins. Medicine Hat is in the HJHL’s South finals for the first time since the 2012-’13 season.

Cubs head coach and general manager Randy Wong said it feels good getting through a series as quick as they did.

“Anytime that you can finish a series in four, that certainly feels good,” Wong said. “The guys feel good, it gives us confidence and gives us a chance to get ready for the next round.”

Net minder Dawsen Savage made 24 saves for the win as the Cubs scored three un answered goals to net their series sweep.

Coaldale’s Mason Sande opened the game’s scoring two minutes into the contest as the Copperheads tried to avoid the sweep in their own building. James Halverson added to Coaldale’s lead 4:09 later as the home team jumped out to a 2-0 lead less than halfway through the first period.

Those were the last goals of their season.

Colby Friedrich scored the Cubs first goal of the game with 6:21 left in the first period. His line mates, Levi Schlosser and Jacob Milne picked up the helpers on Friedrich’s third goal of the post season.

That line of Friedrich, Schlosser and Milne known as the ‘grey line’ because of the colour of their practice jerseys, kept the offence going in the first.

Milne scored a little over three minutes after Friedrich to tie the game up at 2-2 heading into the first intermission. Schlosser and Friedrich had the assists on Milne’s third of the playoffs.

When asked what the feelings were on the bench after going down 2-0 early, Wong said he was happy with how his guys rebounded and eventually took the lead.

“We came out a little flat, they knew that this could be their last game. We talked about it, we expected they would come out with some push and they certainly did,” Wong said. “I’m happy with how our guys settled down once we got that first one and then we kind of started playing our game a little bit more.”

“Just have to realize what it takes to finish off teams and certainly how Coaldale put on their–this was their best game of the series and that’s expected from an older team that is on the verge of losing the series.”

Callen Prosofsky scored eight minutes into the second period to put the Cubs ahead 3-2. Connor Douglas had the lone assist on the last goal of the game as the Cubs and Savage shut the door for the last 32 minutes of the game.

Coaldale outshot the Cubs 26-23 throughout the game but it wasn’t enough to stave off elimination.

The Cubs now await the winner of the series between the Okotoks Bisons and the Strathmore Wheatland Kings. The regular season champion Bisons lead the series 3-1 with game five underway Friday night in Okotoks.

See Friday’s paper for a full story on the Cubs series win and their approach for the South finals.