Although the games counted as two losses in the standings, the Estevan Sherritt Coal Bruins had arguably their best weekend of the season with the Yorkton Terriers in town.
Against the powerhouse Terriers, whose last regular season loss came two seasons ago, the peewee AA Bruins played inspired hockey and pushed Yorkton as far as they could.
The damage in the end was a 6-4 win for Yorkton on Saturday, including an empty netter, and a 7-3 victory on Sunday.
"I'll tell you what, there's no team that's played them as well as we did this weekend.
"I think their closest game before this was three goals," said Bruins head coach Jeff Pierson.
"At the end of the day, we didn't come out with any points, but it was a huge weekend for our team. They're a team that's not just skilled, but they can be so intimidating."
On Saturday, Bruins' star Cole Fonstad led the way with all four goals.
The Bruins fell behind 4-1 early in the second period, then took advantage of some undisciplined play by the Terriers to get back in the thick of it.
"We were down 4-1. Usually when you're down 4-1 to them, you'll lose 10-1 or 10-2 or whatever combination of lopsidedness you want," said Pierson.
But with Yorkton taking three straight penalties in quick succession, Fonstad took over the game.
He made it 4-2 on a blistering top shelf shot from the left faceoff circle, then fired a similar shot from the high slot moments later to get the Bruins within a goal. Both markers came with a two-man advantage.
Late in the period, the Terriers got one back on a point-blank shot on the power play to go ahead 5-3 after two periods.
But Fonstad wasn't finished, hammering home a slap shot on yet another 5-on-3 to make it a one-goal game again.
"Those were obviously 5-on-3 goals and when Cole has that much ice to work with, the puck's usually going to end up in the back of the net. Our team is quite dependent on his offence," said Pierson.
The Bruins had several chances to tie the game after that, including one with about 40 seconds to play, but weren't able to do so. The Terriers would add an empty netter.
On Sunday, the Bruins started the game on fire but couldn't hang on.
They led 2-0 early on, managed to keep it at 3-3 later in the game, and then "took five minutes off," as Pierson put it.
"They quickly made it 7-3, we took a time out and for the rest of the game we played them 0-0 and had quite a few chances."
Fonstad scored twice for Estevan and Mason Strutt had the other goal.
The bad news Sunday was that the team's top defenceman, Kade McMillen, suffered a broken collarbone in the first period.
The Bruins were slated to play Game 2 of their first-round provincial series in Moose Jaw last night - it had been scheduled for Jan. 9, but the Bruins opted not to go due to bad road conditions - and Pierson said the timing could not be better.
"I think the biggest thing it can do is give the kids the confidence that they can play against anyone. If they can play like that against any other team, they'll beat them," he said.
"We gave them all they can handle, and I'm extremely proud of the entire team."
The Bruins led that series by one goal entering last night's game. A win would send them to face Yorkton in the next round.
