The Saskatchewan Bantam Hockey League's northern division teams aren't giving the southern bantam AA league teams a lot of love.
The Estevan TS&M Bruins were blown out 10-0 by the Northeast Wolfpack Sunday at Affinity Place, less than 24 hours after the Saskatoon Maniacs defeated the Bruins 4-3 with 40 seconds left n regulation in the same building.
“We put a good effort on them for sure,” said Bruins Tom Copeland. “That was a good hockey game. There's some stuff we want back there. We hit some posts and we had some chances and we should have put them away and we didn't. The second periods have killed us in both games.”
Saturday, the Bruins' Turner McMillen opened the scoring at 3:50 of the first period but Saskatoon tied it up less than three minutes later. That second period Copeland mentioned? The Bruins were outshot 36-13 in that period alone and although Kaden Chrest scored to give the Bruins a brief lead, goaltender Zane Winter was peppered with shots, keeping 34 of them out that period.
Chrest tied it up on the power play at 7:50 in the third period but with 38 seconds left the Maniacs scored the winning goal.
Momentum was not on the Bruins' side as they surrendered five first period goals to the Wolfpack Sunday afternoon and were down 3-0 less than five minutes in.
“We weren't ready to go (Sunday), and when you're not ready to go, against a north division team that's a fast team,” said Copeland. “That's as good a team as you're going to see in the league this year. They're good and team speed's going to kill us for awhile. We've got some guys that need to learn to pick up their feet. We're dressing nine first year guys. They'll park it and move on.”
The Wolfpack's other regular season game this season was an 11-2 demolishing of the Weyburn Crescent Point Wings Saturday. Copeland said he'd pushed the team hard the night before the Wolfpack game, especially his second year players, and said he's working on getting the kids more mentally tough. The Wolfpack game was Jackson Miller's first start in net this season.
“He'll take that, park it and move on,” said Copeland. “He's going to see more action in a couple of weeks. It's all about game action and he's got to be ready to go.”
The Bruins' next action is Oct. 8 at home to the Saskatoon Generals. Gametime is 2:30 p.m. at Affinity Place.
