Moose Jaw, SK – The Moose Jaw Warriors face-off with a familiar foe to open the week at the Hangar.
The Warriors will welcome in the Swift Current Broncos to downtown Moose Jaw for the first half of a midweek home-and-home set between the two rivals.
“Sometimes we struggle with getting into the game early and with Swift, it’s usually not too hard,” Warriors forward Rilen Kovacevic said. “It will be nice to play them back-to-back and get things going right away.”
Moose Jaw enters the game having dropped three straight after losing to Lethbridge and Medicine Hat last weekend, while the Broncos are winners of three straight after topping Edmonton, 4-3, on Saturday.
The Warriors lost both games to the Hurricanes and Tigers by a combined score of 15-7.
Warriors head coach Mark O’Leary said the disappointing thing about both games is the team went into the third period with a chance to win.
“It’s just having that competitive mindset that when you’ve found yourself to be in a positive to scratch out one or two points, you’ve got to find a way to sustain that for three periods,” he said.
“It’s definitely something that’s all part of the development path for any player, but so much of it is a mindset, it’s a 100 percent focus going into the game about the details that you need to execute.”
Kovacevic agreed that the biggest thing for the Warriors coming out of last weekend is finding a way to play a complete game.
“There’s really good spurts in our game, we just struggle with putting together 60 minutes,” he said.
“It’s all little things that add up to the minutes that you miss and everybody collectively just needs to be better, there’s no hiding from the truth, we deserve better for ourselves and we’ll just see what comes out.”
The Broncos enter Tuesday night’s game sitting second in the East Division and third in the Eastern Conference with a 11-6-0-0 record.
O’Leary said the Broncos play the same style as always, which is fast.
“They do a real good job of generating offense, but it’s a lot of the same things that we’ve seen from them in the past, they do have a fast transition off the rush and when they’re at their best, they do a real good job of getting behind the defence,” he said.
“It’s going to be important for us that we keep everything in front of us and again, limiting those opportunities for fast transitions and making sure that we have numbers above the puck.”
The Warriors and Broncos meet at 7 p.m. in downtown Moose Jaw. It’s Two-For-Tuesday at the Hangar with two-for-one tickets available for the game, click here to get yours.
Tune into all the action on CHL TV and Country 100, the Pre-Game Show on IKS Media Warriors Live hits the air at 6:45 p.m. on Facebook and YouTube.