NEWS PHOTO JAMES TUBB
Medicine Hat Tigers captain Bryce Pickford celebrates his second goal of the night, the overtime winner in a 6-5 victory Friday at Co-op Place over the Moose Jaw Warriors.
jtubb@medicinehatnews.com
Some Freaky Friday action went down in Co-op Place between the Medicine Hat Tigers and Moose Jaw Warriors.
One week after the Tigers beat the Warriors 4-3 in overtime, they again secured a win in an extra frame. The Tigers scored late in the third period Friday to tie up the back-and-forth affair before captain Bryce Pickford scored his second of the night to win the game in overtime, extending the Tigers’ win streak to eight game.
“We had lots of chances to score on that, but Moose Jaw played a really good game,” head coach Willie Desjardins said. “They battled hard, it’s hard traveling in, they’ve lost the key guy up there and I thought they showed a lot of heart the way they played today. We were fortunate to get our points.”
Earlier in the day Friday, Moose Jaw announced captain Lynden Lakovic will miss the rest of the season after undergoing surgery to repair an upper-body injury. The 2024 first-round pick of the Washington Capitals had 18 goals and 29 points in 22 games.
After a goal-less first half of the opening period, Moose Jaw got on the board with a power play marker.
Ethan Semeniuk worked the puck out of the corner to Aiden Ziprick in the circles to the left of Medicine Hat starter Carter Casey. Ziprick sent a pass cross-ice to a wide open Landen McFadden who beat Casey with a blast for the 1-0 lead at 12:13.
The Tigers responded with a pair to end the first with a 2-1 lead.
Shaeffer Gordon-Carroll had the puck in the Moose Jaw end and after circling towards the net, fired a shot that beat starter Kyle Jones to make it a 1-1 game at 14:12. Jonas Woo had the lone assist on Gordon-Carroll’s seventh of the season.
The 17-year-old Tiger was playing in his first game since Oct. 22, missing over a month due to an upper-body injury. Friday night’s contest was also defenceman Niilopekka Muhonen’s first game since Oct. 29, out with a lower-body injury.
They grabbed the one-goal lead with 2:39 left in the period on a two-on-one rush.
Yaroslav Bryzgalov carried the puck up ice and dished off to Ethan Neutens in the Moose Jaw end for the rush goal, his fourth on the year. Veeti Väisänen had the second assist.
The Warriors started the second period with 1:23 of power play time, unable to score on the man advantage. They did capitalize on a breakaway alter in the frame.
After the Tigers put on sustained pressure in the Moose Jaw end, Ziprick sprung Steven Steranka for a breakaway where he scored his second of the season, tying the game up 7:02 into the frame.
The Tigers regained a brief one-goal thanks to the captain’s first. Noah Davidson had the puck below the goal line and fed Bryce Pickford in the slot for a one-timer and his 21st of the season. Woo had the second assist on Pickford’s markers tying him with Kamloops’ JP Hurlbert for the WHL goalscoring lead.
Just 32 seconds later, a point shot from Ziprick beat Casey to tie the game up at 3-3.
The Tigers once again jumped ahead by one, capitalizing on a rebound.
A Pickford shot missed the net wide, bouncing out front to Cam Parr who knocked the puck off a pad to Kadon McCann who jammed home the goal. His 12th of the season made it a 4-3 Medicine Hat lead seven seconds over the halfway point, a lead that stood through 40 minutes.
The Warriors tied the game up at 4-4, scoring on their first shot of the third period.
Just under five minutes into the frame, Semeniuk split the Tigers defence and beat Casey for his first on the night.
The Warriors second lead of the night came the same way their first goal did, on a power play.
Fresh off a face off win, McFadden knocked home a rebound for his second of the night and the 5-4 Moose Jaw lead with 10:46 left in the third period.
The Tigers tied it up with the goalie pulled. After the Tigers won a face-off outside the Moose Jaw end, Casey skated to the bench with 1:41 left in the game. The Tigers poured chance after chance on net, hitting bodies, Jones between the pipes and the post themselves, looking for the tying goal.
Markus Ruck had the puck along the wall to the left of Jones and he threw it towards the net as the clock trickled down. The puck bounced off a Moose Jaw defender and into the net, tying the game up with 21 seconds left in the game.
Liam Ruck and Pickford had the assists on Markus’ seventh of the season, sending the game to overtime.
The Tigers had their chances early in the extra frame, with Woo just missing on a bank play off the back wall. Misha Volotovskii had the puck up near the point in the Moose Jaw end and he skated in, getting tripped up, drawing a power play.
Just like they did trying to tie the game, the Tigers poured on shots. Woo picked up a rebound to the right of the Moose Jaw net and fed Pickford in his spot at the top of the circles and the captain unleashed a laser that found twine for his 22nd on the year and his league-leading sixth game-winning goal.
Pickford’s 22nd keeps him atop the CHL defenceman scoring race and has him tied with Hurlbert for the WHL lead in goals after the Blazers’ forward scored in a 5-4 shootout loss to the Prince George Cougars.
Casey finished with 15 saves for his eighth win on the season, Jones made 38 stops. The Tigers outshot Moose Jaw 44-20, also winning the face-off battle 35-26 Moose Jaw finished 2-3 on the power play, the Tiger man advantage was 1-2.
Pickford says they were calm despite losing the lead and jumped on their chances when they needed to.
“We did our thing and in OT, we kind of just knew that what we had to do and we executed it pretty well,” Pickford said. “Misha drawing that penalty was huge for us, then we know we were going to score a goal there. So yeah, really, probably the group. I’m really proud of the group, we battled back like always and we just have to keep it going.”
The Tigers (20-6-3-2) host the Swift Current Broncos on Saturday for the penultimate game before the Holiday break.
