If there was ever a game that proved that you could not take any night off in the Kramer Division, you could look no further than Saturday's game between the Battlefords North Stars and Notre Dame Hounds.
The North Stars had entered the night one point back of the Hounds for second place. But instead, they ended up on the wrong end of a 3-1 score that dropped them to 8-4-3 on the season - a record not even good enough to escape the division basement, where they are now tied with Humboldt.
"We went from being at the top of the standings to last place," said coach Kevin Hasselberg after the game.
"Our guys have got to look at that and understand how tight things are. We weren't consistent tonight, and it cost us two points." He added "maybe that's what we've got to do - start at the bottom again."
The game was highlighted early on by good goaltending and defensive play, and there was no scoring after one period. The second period was more of the same, but the Hounds were able to score first as Devin Gerun scored from Jon Paris to make it 1-0 at the 13:28 mark.
The North Stars were able to tie it up soon after on Ryne Keller's first of the season, with the assist to Jake McMillen and Brenden Heinrich at 16:34.
That would round out the scoring through two periods. Shots were 24-19 for the North Stars by this point.
The third period remained knotted at 1-1 until the 15:16 mark when Cory Anderson beat Spencer Tremblay with a controversial goal on a play in which Tremblay argued he was interfered with.
Several Hounds had swarmed the net, and Hasselberg said he was going to look at the tape to see exactly what happened.
"I'm not sure if our goaltender was interfered with or not, but at the end of the day when you look at how that puck went in, our goaltender was flat on his back and there was no one in the net," said coach Hasselberg.
"We'll look at it on video and if we see that there was interference there, then obviously the official made the poor call."
In the end, the goal counted. Nathan Walsh and Dion Antisin got the assists.
With the North Stars down a goal late, coach Hasselberg pulled his netminder for the extra attacker, and then caught a huge break when the Hounds' Peyton Hogan was called for cross-checking with 35 seconds left, giving the North Stars a commanding 6-on-4 opportunity.
But Anderson's empty netter right from the face off with nine seconds left sealed the win for the Hounds, snapping what for them was a slide that saw them win only once in seven games.
Tremblay had stopped 24 of 26 shots on the night ,while Alexi Thibaudeau stopped 29 of 30 for the win.
The loss left Hasselberg steamed at the officiating, but he tried to find some positives.
"I thought our guys worked hard for the most part. We've got to find consistency in our effort so that we can keep that sustained pressure over 60 minutes and when you're going through difficult times like this, you've got to stay up and you've got to keep believing in what the process is going to produce for us."
Now the North Stars have to collect their thoughts and regroup for their trip to Melfort against the Mustangs, where they need to try and put their recent losing home stand behind them.
"We don't like having these challenges," said Hasselberg. "Everybody wants to win hockey games. Certainly you've got to take the 24 hours to cool down and not let it affect you."
