Blades fall to Hitmen in OT
The Saskatoon Blades are playing with fire these days and it doesn’t help when they keep handing the opposition matches.
Friday night’s game against the visiting Calgary Hitmen was no exception as the Blades dropped a 5-4 overtime decision in Western Hockey League action before an announced crowd of 3,579 fans at SaskTel Centre.
With the loss, Saskatoon falls to 32-31-3-1 and falls five points behind the Prince Albert Raiders, who pulled off an upset win over the Moose Jaw Warriors for their eighth win in a row.
The Hitmen’s Tristan Nielsen scored the game-winner at 1:58 of overtime to put the Blades’ playoff chances in peril.
The Blades didn’t make it easy on themselves by allowing a pair of short-handed goals during the same power play against the Hitmen — instead of possibly going up 3-1, they surrendered the lead and the game was knotted at 3-3 after the opening frame.
Earlier in the period, the Blades jumped to a quick 1-0 lead on a goal by Gage Ramsay just 1:48 into the game, but soon gave up a two-on- zero and the Hitmen tied things up at 2:38, thanks to Tristen Nielson.
Back-to-back goals by Josh Paterson, on a nifty tick-tack-toe, and Mark Rubinchik, trailing on a 3-on-2, gave Saskatoon a 3-1 lead with 6:03 left in the first period.
That didn’t last, as Mark Kastelic and Nielson notched short-handed goals for Calgary to even the score.
After a scoreless second period, Braylon Shmyr put the Blades back ahead on a wraparound and bank shot off a Hitmen defender’s skate 41 seconds into the third period.
Calgary tied it at 4-4 on a goal by Carson Focht, who spun around in front of the net to beat Blades rookie goalie Nolan Maier at 8:35.
Nielsen netted the game-winner at 1:58 of overtime to complete his hat-trick.