Rush drop below .500 with loss to Calgary
Game adds third straight loss to home team’s mini slump early in the season
For the Saskatchewan Rush, it was supposed to be just what the National Lacrosse League doctor ordered.
Right?
With the Rush looking to break out of an early-season mini slump, who better to play than their biggest rivals in the NLL?
After all, the Rush had won 10 of the last 11 NLL regular-season games with the Roughnecks and the last three NLL playoff matchups, including a 15-13 win over Calgary during the 2018 NLL playoffs in the West Division final.
The lacrosse sticks appeared to be aligned in Saskatchewan’s favour. Well, think again.
The visiting Roughnecks wouldn’t have anything to do with recent history and handed the Rush a 17-12 loss in NLL action before a crowd of 13,426 fans at Sasktel Centre.
“The law of averages were that Calgary was probably going to beat us (sooner or later),” said Rush head coach and GM Derek Keenan, whose reigning NLL champion Rush slipped to 3-4 on the season with a third straight loss.
“They hadn’t beat us in a long time. We hadn’t lost a game in our division last year.”
Saskatchewan couldn’t contain Calgary’s trio of Curtis Dickson, Dane Dobbie and Tyler Pace, who had four goals apiece. Dickson led the way with four goals and seven assists for an 11-point night. Dobbie added six assists for 10 points. Pace had three helpers for a seven-point night.
Former Rush forwards Riley Loewen, with a pair, and Dan Taylor also scored for Calgary, which improves to 5-4 with its second win in a row. Dan Macrae and Mitch Wilde added singles.
Saskatchewan finds itself in unfamiliar territory: steeped in adversity.
“You know what? Our division is really tight (this year) and next weekend is really important to us,” noted Keenan, whose Rush heads to Vancouver next week to play the Warriors.
“Now we’re going to show what we’re made of. We haven’t had a lot of it (adversity up until now). I trust our group. I think we’ve got the right guys. We’ve just got to fix a few things and move on. We’ve got to get a win next week in Vancouver.”
Jeff Shattler and Robert Church led the Rush with a hat-trick each. Ryan Keenan and Curtis Knight tallied two apiece. Ben Mcintosh and Mark Matthews added singles. Matthews chipped in with three helpers as he and Shattler each had a four-point game for Saskatchewan, which out-shot Calgary 51-38.
“It felt like we played a little bit more consistent throughout (compared to the previous two losses), but we’re just not good enough defensively,” said Rush captain Chris Corbeil, adding that “defensive breakdowns” were the common denominator in all three losses.
“We ran into a really good goaltender (Christian Del Bianco, who made 39 saves on Saturday). I thought our offence was getting chances. If we miss one in their end, hit a bar or something, it wound up in our net at the other end.”
The Roughnecks were good on two of two power play chances, which included a five-minute advantage on a major penalty for elbowing assessed to Rush defender Nick Bilic. Saskatchewan was 1-for-1 on the power play.
So far this season, the streaky Roughnecks have had a threegame winning streak and threegame losing streak.
It’s the first-ever three-game losing streak for the Rush since the team moved to Saskatoon.
“Tonight was kind of a microcosm of the last three,” said Keenan. “It’s just not consistent enough. We’ve had real good starts, but then we’ve had some breakdowns defensively. I thought we had a lot of really good scoring chances that we either didn’t bury or we hit a lot of pipes.
“We really could have been up by a bunch at half time, but it was an even game (7-7), and then they came out really strong in the third (with five straight goals) and then that five-minute power play really hurt. They only got one on it but they got one at the end there in transition. It really gave us no opportunity to play offence.
“But we battled right until the end. This team hasn’t faced a lot of adversity, so now we’re going to show what we’re made of and I have full confidence in our guys that we’re going to turn it around.”