Another week, another couple of road losses for the Humboldt Broncos as they traveled to Northern Saskatchewan on Feb. 5 & 6 and returned home being outscored 13-3. The losses extended the Broncos’ road losing streak to 23 games.
Broncos captain Corey Dambrauskas says it is something he has never seen before but he added that the team just needs to bare down and keep fighting.
“Once you get in a slump it’s just so hard to get out of it, I can’t explain it, it’s so hard. Everything goes wrong but you have to battle to get out of it, you have to have the heart to get out of it.”
Frustration is understandably starting to mount for the Broncos as the season winds down and the losing streak continues to grow.
“This streak on the road needs to end. Playoffs are always on the road too, we have to win games on the road too. I don’t know what it is we just haven’t been able to pull out a win on the road,” Dambrauskas lamented.
Their first game came in Flin Flon against the red-hot Bombers.
As has been the case all too often this season the Broncos found themselves in a hole less than five minutes into the first period.
Broncos forward Daniel McKitrick scored just before the midway mark to tie the game at 1. The game remained tied for only 44 seconds however as the Bombers regained a one goal advantage.
The Bombers would add two more goals including one with 26 seconds left in the first period to take a 4-1 lead into the intermission.
After giving up four goals on 14 shots Broncos goalie Carter Seminuk’s night was finished as Ryan Larochelle took over to start the second period.
The teams played over 17 minutes of scoreless hockey before Chris Van Os-Shaw cut the lead in half to extend his points streak to five games. Logan Schatz had the lone assist on the goal and extended his own points streak to ten games.
Twenty-five seconds later, the Bombers regained their three goal edge and for the second period in a row the Broncos gave up a goal in the final minute of the period.
“I think we have to get better at that for sure…those just bite ya. Those one or two goals makes games and that’s what we need to get away from,” said Dambrauskas.
With their season slowly slipping away the Broncos went into the third period trailing 5-2 and needing a huge comeback.
The Broncos carried the play for the early parts of the third period until a pair of pad saves on Broncos forward Trevor Posch turned the momentum. Within about three minutes, the Bombers scored three times to put the game away for good. When the final buzzer sounded the scoreboard read 8-2 and the shot clock read 44-28, both in favour of the Bombers.
The next night the Broncos were in La Ronge for a date with the Ice Wolves.
The Ice Wolves grabbed the lead at 6:40 of the first period on the power play after Connor Swystun was sent off for holding. The Broncos were then given a chance to score the equalizer when they got a power play of their own less than a minute later.
The power play turned out to fire up the Ice Wolves as they scored twice shorthanded 16 seconds apart to grab a 3-0 lead.
For the second game in a row, the Broncos would give their starting goalie the hook as Larochelle was replaced in favour of Seminuk after giving up three goals on nine shots. Seminuk made five saves in relief to get the Broncos to the intermission down by three.
Michael Korol scored at 12:03 of the second period to cut the Broncos deficit to two but as has been the case far too often this season the Broncos gave up a goal with under two minutes to go in the period. At the end of the second period the Broncos trailed 4-1 after giving up two power play and two shorthanded goals.
Looking to start a comeback the Broncos received a power play at 12:03 of the third period but again it was the Ice Wolves who cashed in putting the game out of reach with their third shorthanded goal of the game.
Special teams was the Broncos down fall as they outscored the Ice Wolves 1-0 at five-on-five but were outscored 5-0 during five-on-four action for either team during their 5-1 loss.
Despite the lengthy losing streaks and the lopsided scores Dambrauskas says the weekend was not all negative.
“I thought we made some steps going forward but the little mistakes we make, they always seem to bite us there always in the back of the net.”
He said the team finished a lot more checks, were harder to play against, were giving the puck away less and created some good shots on goal. He feels if the team can continue to incorporate those aspects into their coming games while
limiting the little mistakes they have a good chance at snapping the streak.
Next Week
After a three game road trip the Broncos return home for three games this week.
Their first game comes Feb. 9 in a rematch with the Ice Wolves.
Then the Broncos have a pair of weekend games Feb. 12 against Kindersley and Feb. 13 against Weyburn.
