NEWS PHOTO JAMES TUBB
Medicine Hat Tigers goaltender Zach Zahara slides to his right to make a pad save in the first period of a 5-2 win Tuesday at Co-op Place over the Swift Current Broncos.
The Medicine Hat Tigers made the most of being shorthanded Tuesday night.
With only 17 skaters, nine being natural forwards, Medicine Hat rattled off five unanswered goals for a 5-2 victory over the Swift Current Broncos at Co-op Place.
Medicine Hat was missing Andrew Basha who is day-to-day with a lower body injury and late scratch Tomas Mrsic who was out with illness. Associate coach Joe Frazer described the victory as a team win.
“How we beat them matters too, we fell down 2-0 and they’ve had our number and going into last year except for the last game to get into the playoffs,” Frazer said. “So to be able to come back and push back, an outstanding penalty kill late in the second, late in the third another outstanding kill. Just having different guys step up, it was just a total team effort.”
Swift Current struck first with two rapid goals in the opening frame.
Dawson Gerwing scored on a rush opportunity for the Broncos, opening the scoring 9:20 into the contest. Owen Pickering and Connor Gabriel had the helpers.
Just 2:19 later Swift Current struck on a power play. Clarke Caswell scored his 13th of the season as a Medicine Hat penalty was just about to expire. Brady Birnie and Luke Mistelbacher had the assists.
Medicine a hat got on the board in the first with a rush goal from Hunter St. Martin. The 18-year-old broke into the Swift Current end with Shane Smith who had the puck. Smith fired a shot on net and the rebound popped right to St. Martin who knocked it in at 15:33 to make it a 2-1 game. Kadon McCann had the second assist.
Medicine Hat pushed late in the first with extended pressure but couldn’t solve Reid Dyck for a second time in the period.
St. Martin says despite capitalizing on the late period push, they knew they were putting Swift Current on their heels and taking momentum.
“We were starting to play our game,” St. Martin said. “We had a slow start obviously, going down two, so we started to play into our game. We were fast, we had relentless pressure in there. So that was huge for the momentum in our group.”
The Tigers had 56 seconds of power play time carry into the middle frame but couldn’t capitalize on it. They did just fine at five-on-five soon after.
Gavin McKenna had the puck in the Bronco end and after a lap, skated around the Swift Current net and sends a pad to St. Martin who taps it in to tie the game up 3:06 into the period.
Medicine Hat struck again just over seven minutes later. Oasiz Wiesblatt drew a Swift penalty after being slashed in the background of the legs by Dyck. Eight seconds into that man advantage, Wiesblatt fired a puck on net from the point that was tipped in by a Bronco defender. McKenna and Reid Andresen had the helpers on the goal 10:44 into the frame.
Medicine Hat struck again with its youngest player. McKenna unleashed a wrist shot from the face-off dot top shelf last Dyck. Tyler MacKenzie and Josh Van Mulligen had the assists on McKenna’s 17th, as they led 4-2 with 4:16 left in the frame.
The Tigers raised the blood pressure of the 2,650 of fans in attendance late in the frame. They found themselves on a minute-long five-on-three penalty kill with 2:08 left in the period.
Medicine Hat killed off both penalties and escaped the second period with the lead in shots, 20-12 and goals 4-2. It was a penalty kill goaltender Zach Zahara, who made 19 saves for the win, says shifted momentum on their side even more.
“They didn’t have much in the first 17 mutes of that period, so we can’t give them anything in the last few minutes there,” Zahara said. “So we just crunched down and killed it off, which was huge.”
Medicine Hat carried the momentum into the third period, scoring 1:49 into the final period with a tap-in goal off McCann’s stick. Vasyl Spilka carried the puck from behind the net and fed it to McCann who eventually knocked it in for his eighth of the season, Smith had the second assist.
Swift Current pushed in the third, outshooting Medicine Hat 9-4 in the frame, but the Tigers held on for the 5-2 win.
Across the ice from Zahara, Dyck made 19 saves as Medicine Hat outshot the Broncos 24-21. The Tigers (27-13-2) head into the busy week, with three games in three days starting Friday when they host the Red Deer Rebels.
