In a contest that saw the last two Canalta Cup champions going head-to-head, it was the special teams battle the made a huge difference.
The Battlefords North Stars scored twice on the man advantage and then shutdown the Melfort Mustangs power play on all three of their attempts as the home side came away with a 3-2 win Friday night in Saskatchewan Junior Hockey League action at the Civic Centre.
“I was really happy with how we played, especially at both ends of the ice,” North Stars forward Owen Lamb said. “We had a couple of lapses where we lost our guy in the defensive zone, but we made up for that with how we played later in the game.
“Our power play was obviously clicking today as well. Melfort likes to pressure up high, so we tried to move the puck down low as quickly as we could and take advantage of that.”
Lamb, who was held without a point until Nov. 28, had a goal and an assist in the win with both of his points coming on the power play.
He helped to set up Dakota Hubner’s first period tally and then converted a two-on-one rush with MacGregor Sinclair just 17 seconds into the second frame in what proved to be the game-winning marker.
“I was starting to get a little worried there if I was ever going to get a goal again when I was going through that dry spell,” Lamb said. “Once it happened, I’ve been playing with a lot of confidence ever since.”
Chasteon Braid had the other goal for the North Stars, who received a 23-save performance from goaltender Joel Grzybowski as he improved his record to 5-0.
The Mustangs, who have a 20-7-4-1 record and are seven points back of the league-leading Nipawin Hawks for first place in the Sherwood Division, got their goals from Drew Warkentine and Jake Misskey while goaltender Evan Plotnik turned aside 29 shots.
“You have to give a lot of credit to Battlefords as they did a great job on defence tonight to shut us down,” Mustangs head coach and general manager Trevor Blevins said.
“We didn’t bring a consistent effort tonight to be honest. Our veteran guys should have been more excited to play these guys, but we didn’t have it for a full 60 minutes.”
With the win, the North Stars improved their record to 23-5-2-0 and have a four-point cushion over the Notre Dame Hounds for the top spot in the Global Ag Risk Solutions Division.
They are also four points back of the Hawks for first place in the league standings, but they do have three games in hand.
The North Stars will return to action Saturday night for a 7:30 p.m. against the Flin Flon Bombers at the Civic Centre, in what will be their final game before Christmas.
Prior to that contest, North Stars defenceman Levi Kleiboer will play for a gold medal at the World Junior A Challenge in Truro, N.S. at 1 p.m. as Canada West takes on the United States in a game that will air nationally on TSN1.
Canada West, which is coached by Bombers bench boss Mike Reagan, punched their ticket to the final Thursday night as they defeated the Czech Republic 5-1 in the semifinal.
Kleiboer, who is joined on the team by Bombers forward Chrystopher Collin, has played in four of his team’s games but is still looking for his first point of the tournament.
