Moose Jaw, SK — For the second straight night, the Moose Jaw Warriors had a lead through two periods, but couldn’t finish the job.
The Warriors surrendered three goals in the third period and dropped a 4-3 game to the Saskatoon Blades on Saturday night at the Moose Jaw Events Centre.
“We treated it like a playoff game, that’s for sure, but at the end of the day, you can win games in the third period and you can lose games and tonight, we lost a game in the third period,” Warriors forward Atley Calvert said after the game.
“We weren’t ready to go and they came out and caught us on our heels a bit, they buried two and at the end of the day, that’s the game.”
Calvert finished with a goal and two points in his 200th Western Hockey League game playing opposite his younger brother Rowan, who had an assist in his 100th career game.
Kalem Parker scored the annual Teddy Bear Toss goal with 10 seconds left in the first period, sending thousands of bears flying onto the ice. They will be donated to the Salvation Army Moose Jaw’s hamper program to help less fortunate families during the holiday season.
On the ice, the Warriors lost their third straight this week, falling to 17-12-0-2 this season.
Warriors associate coach Scott King said the team needs to be more engaged to start the game and periods.
“It’s a matter of coming out of the locker room, the game started, you’ve got to be ready to rock and for whatever reason, we weren’t,” he said. “It’s disappointing to start a period like that and get yourselves in a hole.”
Saskatoon came out of the gates flying and took an early 1-0 lead on a goal from Hudson Kibblewhite just 2:16 into the game.
The Warriors would finally answer back in the final minute of the period when Parker sent the bears flying with his second of the season.
The score remained tied until late in the second when Jagger Firkus scored on a shorthanded breakaway for his 27th of the season, giving the Warriors a 2-1 lead after two.
The Blades responded in a big way to start the third with Fraser Minten scoring only 32 seconds into the frame and then Easton Armstrong adding on just under three minutes later to make it 3-2 for Saskatoon.
Moose Jaw would tied the game when Calvert fired home his 18th of the season with 7:54 to play in the third.
Just over three minutes later, the Blades would retake the lead for good as Morgan Tastad’s point shot found its way through traffic to make it a 4-3 final.
“Everyone’s scrambling for points around Christmas time, you want to go on the Christmas break feeling good, obviously, and we didn’t get the results here tonight, but we have an opportunity to hopefully close out with three wins next week,” Calvert said.
Jackson Unger made 22 saves in the loss, while the Warriors outshot Saskatoon 33-26 on the night.
Neither team scored on the power play as Moose Jaw went 0-for-1 and Saskatoon was 0-for-2.
The Warriors are back in action on Tuesday when they host the Kelowna Rockets at the Moose Jaw Events Centre to begin the final week of the first half.