The Yorkton Terriers opened the Saskatchewan Junior Hockey League (SJHL) regular season with a home and home series against the Weyburn Red Wings.
Game 1 of the series at the Crescent Point Place Arena in Weyburn Friday night was a close affair with both teams recording 22 shots on goal. The Yorkton Terriers managed to squeak out a close 3-2 win.
Terrier right winger Jamie Vlanich opened the scoring with the first Terrier goal of the season, assisted by Nathan Murray Midway through the first period.
Coltyn Sanderson tied the game for the Red Wings a little over eight minutes into he second frame.
Ryan Sookro notched the go-ahead goal on a powerplay, assisted by Vlanich to hand Yorkton a one goal edge.
Kyle McLeod scored the game winner, another powerplay goal, early in the final frame, assisted by Jeremy Johnson and Chase Norrish.
Weyburn's Jessie Ross pulled the Red Wings within one late in the third, but it proved to be too little, too late.
Yorkton Netminder Warren Shymko turned aside 20 of the 22 shots on goal.
Saturday at the Farrell Agencies Arena the Red Wings, though outshot 37-20 by Yorkton, came out on top of a very close 2-1 final score.
Jackson Schneider opened the scoring for the Wings early in the first period to give Weyburn a 1-0 lead which held for two periods.
Trent Hermary added a second Weyburn marker to give the Wings a very brief two goal lead.
Zak Majkowski pulled Yorkton within one goal 33 seconds later, assisted by Vlanich and Sookro. Try as they might, the Terriers simply couldn't put away the tying goal.
Terrier head coach Trent Cassan says it's tough to win the first game on the road, especially if it's the opposing team's home opener. He credits the solid goaltending provided by Shymko for the win. "To be able to get the first victory on the road is a good thing," he declares.
A good powerplay and penalty kill can give a team some momentum. Yorkton's powerplay made the difference in Weyburn and Weyburn's goalie provided great penalty kill in Yorkton. Both made the difference in the final game scores.
Cassan suggest perhaps some Terriers tensed up a little bit at home. "We were shooting into his pads quite a bit or getting shots blocked because guys wanted to score and it didn't work out for us tonight," he suggests.
It was their first weekend of hockey for a lot of the Terriers and they had some ups and downs, Cassan adds. Every team has that, he continues.
With the high turnover of players at the end of last season, the Terriers have a lot of new players. Cassan says he put them into situations to see how they handled them. "If they excel in it, they get other opportunities but you see which guys can accept those situations and then you can reassess if you need to put other guys in that position," he explains.
He suggests the first period both Friday and Saturday was pretty scrambly for both teams. "Both teams did seem a little bit uptight," Cassan states.
The effort improved in the second and third periods but the Terriers just weren't able to find that tying goal, he says.
Yorkton had two players on the injured list for the weekend, Brent Struble and Kelly Less-meister. "You're going to go through injuries no matter what happens. It's unfortunate but it gives us a chance to evaluate some other guys," Cassan says.
The Terriers don't play much in the next 10 to 12 days which allows a bit more time to practise some systems and individual skills, Cassan notes.
At this point in the season with all the new players, Cassan says he's not really looking at the big picture. He's looking for daily improvement, how well each one is willing to learn, listen and work hard. "We want to see a progression as the year goes on. If we can see that then maybe we can start looking at the big picture later," he closes.
