The Yorkton Harvest put together back-to-back wins at home last week.
Thursday, the Harvest outshot the visiting Notre Dame Hounds 30-18 to come out with a 5-1 wins over the dazed Hounds.
A three goal first period put the Harvest in the driver's seat. Ryley Stefanyshyn lit up the scoreboard for Yorkton early in the period assisted by Josh Lees.
Levi cable popped in Yorkton's second goal, a shorthanded marker assisted by Dustin Skilliter.
Skilliter took it on himself to score Yorkton's third, a shorthanded, solo marker before Cole Gulka notched Notre dame's lone goal of the game to give the Harvest a 3-1 lead after 20 minutes. Ben Johnstone made it 4-1 with the lone goal of the second period assisted by Cable and Skilliter.
Lees capped game scoring with the lone goal of the third period assisted by Kade Halabuza and John Odgers.
Lees capped game scoring with the lone goal of the third period assisted by Kade Halabuza and John Odgers.
Saturday the Yorkton Harvest upset the first place Saskatoon Con-tacts 4-1 at the Farrell Agencies Arena.
Deven Fafard opened the scoring for Yorkton with a late first period powerplay goal assisted by Cable and Skilliter.
Cable added Yorkton's second goal assisted by Ben Johnstone and Skilliter.
With less than a minute left in the opening period, Taylor Reich scored for the lone goal of the game for Saskatoon.
Tanner LeSann gave the Harvest a two goal edge with the lone goal of the second period assisted by Odgers and Yanni Mamais.
Cable notched his second of the game to cap the scoring midway through the third period assisted by Lesann and Rylan Badduke.
Harvest head coach Graham Garrett says, "That's a huge win for us today. That's the top team in the league."
The Harvest matched up well against the Contacts. "Everyone played their roles and did their jobs very well, probably the best that we've done this year," Garrett adds.
It was a total team effort with the Harvest forwards and the defensemen shutting down the Saskatoon top line, preventing them from scoring while producing goals from the other two lines, Garrett reports.
The previous game over Notre Dame was a 'must win' contest for the Harvest. A couple of good individual efforts which produced goals and shutting down the Hounds offense produced the much needed win. "It's good for us to keep the puck out of our net and put some pucks in theirs," Garrett suggests.
Garret claims the Harvest's penalty killing is as good as that of any team in the league. "We have four sets of guys who really commit to what we're doing on the penalty kill up front. Our D-men are very good and we like to put pressure on the others teams' defense to make mistakes. When they cough the puck up, we've been able to capitalize with quite a few shorthanded goals this year," he continues. Garrett believes the Harvest's greatest strength right now is the penalty kill.
With eight or nine games left before the Christmas break, Garrett's goal is to have the Harvest be a 500 team by Christmas. It will take some wins at home as well as bringing wins home from road trips, he insists.
Both goaltenders have turned in great efforts for the last two games, Garrett states. Some veterans like Skilliter and cable have scored some big goals. Secondary scoring also paid off against the Contacts for a total team effort, he concludes.
Sunday afternoon, though they only outshot the Harvest 20-21 at the Moose Jaw Civic Centre, the Moose Jaw Generals snowed the Harvest under 9-4, scoring twice in the first period, three times in the second and rounding out the third period with four goals.
Austin Daae scored both first period goals including one powerplay marker to give the Generals a 2-0 lead after one period.
Daae opened the second period with a goal for his hat trick while Tyler King scored a pair of goals which included a powerplay marker.
Johnstone scored the lone second period goal for the Harvest assisted by Cable.
Dayton Picard scored twice while TJ Reeve, and Kyle Oleniuk each added a single in the final frame to clinch a 9-4 win for Moose Jaw.
The Harvest battled back with three third period goals but the Moose Jaw lead was to high to overcome.
Cable opened third period scoring assisted by Skilliter.
Roddy Sewap notched Yorkton's second third period marker assisted by Mamais and Lesann.
Johnstone capped Harvest scoring with his second of the game assisted by Dakota Odgers and Cable.
