Weekend hits put Calgary in second
Edmonton sweeps pair of games
A quick peek at the Western Hockey League standings in the morning over a glass of OJ, a couple slices of multigrain and a piping hot mug of dark roast showed them sitting second by a technicality, games played, in the Eastern Conference.
By 6:40 p.m., the technical had become the official.
“Personally,” murmured Calgary Hitmen goaltender Chris Driedger, “I HATE being second. Nobody enjoys being second. Being second sucks.
“We did have a healthy lead there for a while. And then, for whatever reason, we decided it’d be a good idea to start losing games. We’ve had a few off days lately, (Saturday) being one. We’ve got to play a lot better if we want to be a team that’s going to challenge for a Memorial Cup.
“So tonight is extremely disap- pointing. We’re here to win. Pretty simple. Anything less is ... unacceptable. So it hurts. But there were some positives. Take ’em and move on. We were working harder — a lot harder — than (Saturday) night.
“We’ve got guys in the room that can do it. I know that. They do, too. We’ve just got to pull it all together here.”
A claustrophobic, scrappy 3-2 OT victory Sunday helped the defending conference champion Edmonton Oil Kings sweep a first-place showdown twin-bill against a battered batch of Hitmen and slide past their provincial rivals by a slender point. There’s a long way to go, many highway miles to travel by bus yet, of course,
“It’s big,” said Oil Kings’ overtime hero Mitchell Moroz. “Everybody was really looking forward to this weekend. We knew after last night they were going to have some pushback. But the feeling in our dressing room was that we were still hungry.
“That was a heckuva game. That was fun to be a part of. Tight. Playoff style. A hard-fought win. To be back in first just means everyone is gunning for you again and so we’ve just got to keep pushing forward.”
The Hitmen had five regulars missing from the lineup Sunday, including captain Jaylen Rissling, again, and scoring winger Pavel Padakin. In Saturday’s miniseries opener up north at Rexall, the Oil Kings slapped ’em around like Stooge Moe Howard giving Curly a face-paddling, to the tune of 7-3. Calgary was outshot, out-thought, outhustled, out-everything’ d.
Back at the Scotiabank Saddledome less than 24 hours later, though, coach Mike Williamson’s crew, obviously blushing beetred after absorbing such a pistolwhipping, was substantially better in every department. And so it took the Calgary-born Moroz swatting a backhand rebound behind Driedger 3:34 into overtime, the goaltender initially clawing away a hot Henrik Samuelsson 2-on-1 shot with his catching glove, to condemn the Hitmen to a fifth defeat in their past seven starts.
“It was a lot better tonight,” acknowledged Williamson. “(Saturday) we had a number of guys who weren’t at the level we needed, got off to a bad start and obviously it snowballed from there.”
“I thought everybody stepped up and did a better job. Not just our younger guys but the older guys who are playing heavy minutes right now, they had to be a lot better. We challenged them. They had to do a better job against the other team’s top players and they responded well.
“Tonight we were engaged early and gave ourselves chances. Unfortunately, we couldn’t find a way to win the hockey game. Positionally we’ve got to clean up a couple things that’ll help us but at least we got back to a good compete level.”
The score line read 1-1 after 20 minutes, 2-2 following 40 and caution ruled the third period, leading to overtime and Moroz’s winner. The hometown villain isn’t expecting to be white-hatted or presented with the keys to the city by Calgary Mayor Naheed Nenshi at City Hall anytime soon.
“Oh, no,” he said, laughing, “I don’t think so. I probably don’t have a lot of fans here anymore. That’s all right. I’m all for Edmonton now. And it’s going to be like that for a long time.”
(Compounding the betrayal, Moroz has been drafted by those nefarious NHL Oilers.)
“This is special for me,” he said. “I’m just so happy to get that win for the guys. My family was here and I know they were pretty emotional. This is one of the most memorable games for me.”
The Oil Kings are rolling. Sunday makes five Ws on the trot, 10 in their last 11 starts. They’ve pieced together a 20-4 record since an 8-3 home caning at the hands of the Prince George Cougars on Nov. 22.
“It was huge weekend, swing-wise, for us,” said Edmonton boss Derek Laxdal. “We saw two teams that are very strong in the conference. We don’t have that offensive power we did a year ago. The chemistry of our club, the culture we’ve established this year, is what we want to keep building on. A lot of our young kids have taken some strides and so have some of the returning veterans, same thing as (Greg) Chase and (Jake) Virtanen” — he jerked his head toward the Hitmen side of the hall at event level — “over there.
“You’re looking at two strong programs, a great rivalry. The kind of hockey you want to see. Pretty clean. Some emotion out there, obviously a carry-over from the conference final last year. In the four years I’ve been here, I can’t remember a game against Calgary that didn’t have that intense-rivalry feel to it.
“It’s a fun game to coach. And I know the kids enjoy playing in them.”
The degree of that enjoyment being directly tied to the result, naturally.
And so, now, all of a sudden after front-running for a while, the Hitmen find themselves in the role of hunters and the Oil Kings in their usual spot as the hunted. Advantage, Edmonton. “It’s something we can build on,” Williamson said of a disappointing Sunday. “Last night there weren’t a lot of positives. It’s good to be able to step on the ice and play again right away. We’re never happy losing a hockey game. We expect to win every time we touch the ice.
“But we took a step forward in some areas. We still need to clean up a few others.”