Moose Jaw, SK — Two of the top teams in the Eastern Conference faced off in a tightly contested battle on Friday night.
The Moose Jaw Warriors ended up falling 2-1 in a shootout to the Medicine Hat Tigers at the Moose Jaw Events Centre.
“It was pretty tight checking, I thought both teams defended well and were quick to jump on checks, so there wasn’t a lot of free ice out there,” Warriors associate coach Scott King said.
Brayden Schuurman scored the lone goal for the Warriors, snapping a ten-game goal drought in the loss.
He said while both teams bring a lot of fire power, it was the defensive games for both sides that stood out.
“There was a lot of high pace, a lot of transition between us and Medicine Hat, we have pretty highly offensive powered teams and I thought we shut it down and so did they, off the rush they limited our chances as well as we limited there’s,” Schuurman said.
Jackson Unger came up big throughout the game for the Warriors, making 27 saves, including 16 combined in the third period and overtime.
Shane Smith scored the shootout winner for the Tigers.
“I thought we played a pretty solid game, obviously on the wrong end of the shootout, but it was a pretty good effort,” King said.
Andrew Basha opened the scoring early in the first period for Medicine Hat and they would take a 1-0 lead into the first intermission.
Moose Jaw struck early in the second when Schuurman fired home his second of the season on the power play to tie the game.
The Warriors would fire 17 shots on the Tigers’ net in the second, but Medicine Hat goalie Evan May made some big stops to keep the game tied.
Neither team could break through in the third, sending the game to overtime where the Warriors received a power play with 23 seconds left, but couldn’t finish.
Lynden Lakovic scored for Moose Jaw in the shootout, but Medicine Hat answered with goals from Smith and Cayden Lindstrom to take the win.
“We did a good job of getting pucks to the net, we just need to make sure we’re getting bodies there,” Schuurman said. “The second and third opportunities are going to be there if our team continues to get to the front of the net.”
The Warriors took three out of four points this week and now sit in third place in the Eastern Conference, three points back of Saskatoon and Medicine Hat.
Moose Jaw will return to action on Tuesday when the Blades come to the Moose Jaw Events Centre at 7 p.m.