PATS EVEN SERIES WITH CANES
WHL EASTERN CONFERENCE FINAL BACK EVEN AFTER REGINA’S 6-2 VICTORY
Regina Pats’ Braydon Buziak puts the puck past Lethbridge Hurricanes’ goaltender Stuart Skinner and Brady Pouteau during Game 4 of the WHL Eastern Conference finals Wednesday at the Enmax Centre in Lethbridge. Pats defeated the Canes 6-2 to even the best-of-seven series at 2-2.
Achance to put their opponent on the ropes has eluded the Lethbridge Hurricanes. The Regina Pats defeated the Hurricanes 6-2 in Game 4 of the teams’ Western Hockey League Eastern Conference final series Wednesday night at the Enmax Centre.
With the loss, the Canes missed a chance to move up 3-1 in the best-of-seven series — now deadlocked at 2-2 with Game 5 back at the Brandt Centre in Regina Friday night.
Wednesday night’s loss also ensures a Game 6 will be in Lethbridge on Sunday at 6 p.m.
The loss comes one night after the Canes put in a solid 60 minutes in a Game 3 win.
But in Game 4 Wednesday, the Canes were unable to contain a more urgent Pats team who broke open a 2-2 tie late in the second with a pair of goals — the first credited to Regina’s Adam Brooks, whose centring pass banked off Hurricanes defenceman Igor Merezhko’s skate and in — before adding another pair of goals in the third.
“We weren’t very good,” said Hurricanes head coach Brent Kisio. “Regina was a lot more desperate and way more urgent. They played hard and we didn’t.”
The teams traded goals through the first two periods. Braydon Buziak got the Pats on the scoreboard midway through the first for a 1-0 lead.
The Canes tied it 2:21 into the second when Dylan Cozens drove to the net and swatted a puck out of mid-air, but Regina regained the lead a little under seven minutes later on Jeff de Wit’s third of the post-season.
Ryan Vandervlis pulled Lethbridge even 34 seconds after de Wit’s goal, but the Pats owned the scoresheet the rest of the way.
Brooks scored the eventual gamewinner with 1:54 left in the second when his pass banked off Merezhko and in.
“It was a bit of a bad bounce there,” said Kisio. “We were in the game, but we weren’t in the game. I don’t think we were playing really hard or playing the way we had to play to beat them. Last night we played hard and we had our feet moving and tonight we just stood around and watched. Give Regina credit, they completely outworked and outplayed us tonight.”
Dawson Leedahl added another Regina goal before the second was over to make it 4-2 before Connor Hobbs added a power-play goal in the third and Wyatt Sloboshan chipped in with an empty-netter with 2:56 remaining.
“I think we raised our urgency and intensity to match theirs,” said Pats head coach John Paddock. “We’ve alternated games like that. To me, that’s the biggest thing. We raised our level of compete.”
The Hurricanes were unable to match it.
“I think we didn’t come ready to play, which is disappointing,” said Vandervlis. “We’ve shown that when we show up and compete we’re the better hockey team. So it’s disappointing.”
Pats forward Sam Steel credited his team for bringing a better effort than Tuesday night.
“I thought we came ready to play a lot better than last night. That wasn’t our type of hockey we played last night and we came out strong tonight and played the full 60 minutes.
“We played more our style of play. They played us really hard the first few games and give credit to them. It’s been a great series so far. But tonight we found another level and made a few more plays.”
The Pats get to take a 2-2 series back to the Brandt Centre, but Paddock wasn’t about to read too much into home-ice advantage.
“It sounds good and it is good, I guess, and you’d rather have your people behind you,” he said. “We’re above .500 on the road. I’m sure they were .500 on the road and I know we were. I think it seems like such evenly-matched, hardplayed games (that) in the end I don’t know what’s going to make the difference.”
With the series deadlocked, the Hurricanes trek back onto familiar terrain as they head back east for Game 5.
“It’s a best-of-three now,” said Kisio. “We’re basically in the same spot we started. It’s just going back in there and we had better be ready to compete and work a lot harder than we did tonight.”