The Moose Jaw Warriors are still searching for the right recipe in back-to-back games this season.
The Warriors dropped the second half of a home-and-home against Medicine Hat, falling 5-1 to the Tigers on Saturday night at the Moose Jaw Events Centre.
“We’ve got to find a way to be better in back-to-back games, it just hasn’t been good to us this season and we have to figure out what’s going on,” Warriors assistant coach Gord Burnett said.
The Warriors started strong, getting a power play goal from Brayden Yager only 2:56 into the game, but Medicine Hat scored five unanswered after that, including four in the second period to take the win.
“It’s disappointing,” Warriors forward Atley Calvert said. “We didn’t play good at all tonight and they made us pay with every mistake that we made.”
The Tigers got two goals each from Brendan Lee and Brayden Boehm as well as 30 saves from Beckett Langkow.
Shane Smith had the other goal for the Tigers, just 1:11 into the second period, which ended up being the game-winner.
Burnett said it was a lack of focus in the second period that sunk the team after a strong first period.
“You get a goal early, it’s a nice goal on the power play, but then we lose our focus, we start checking on the move, we start letting their D jump by us, we’re not winning our battles,” Burnett said.
“If you can’t check, it’s tough to get pucks back or win hockey games.”
Calvert said the Warriors need to be cleaner with the puck to have success.
“We preach puck management and we’ve got to start buying into the puck management, everyone in that room,” he said. “We can’t afford to keep turning pucks over because they end up in the back of our net.”
Connor Ungar stopped 14-of-17 shots before being replaced by Jackson Unger in the second period. Unger made nine saves on 10 shots the rest of the way as Moose Jaw outshot Medicine Hat, 31-27, in the loss.
The Warriors fired 12 shots on the Tigers’ net in the third period, but couldn’t find a spark.
Moose Jaw finished 1-for-4 on the power play, while going 2-for-2 on the penalty kill.
The Warriors will look to rebound when they host the Prince Albert Raiders on Tuesday night at the Moose Jaw Events Centre.
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