Flamand’s four points pace Wheaties past Blades

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This article was published 03/01/2025 (354 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The Brandon Wheat Kings won their fourth road game in a row as Nolan Flamand scored twice and added two assists in a 6-2 victory over his hometown Saskatoon Blades in Western Hockey League action at SaskTel Centre on Friday.

Brandon (18-11-3-2) received two goals from defenceman Dylan Ronald and singles from Marcus Nguyen and Joby Baumuller, with Tanner Scott and Grayden Siepmann replying for Saskatoon (20-12-2-2) in front of a crowd of 4,121.

Brandon general manager and head coach Marty Murray said Flamand had a terrific outing.

“If you look back on his last number of games, he’s been producing for a while, which is great to see,” Murray said. “You need that out of your 20-year-olds, you need them contributing. I thought Nolan had a really good game and has been playing real good hockey lately.”

The Wheat Kings struck first five minutes 13 seconds into the opening frame when Matteo Michels made a drop pass to Ronald and the 18-year-old defenceman beat Saskatoon goalie Evan Gardner over his glove with a wristshot.

Brandon took a 9-2 edge in shots in the first nine minutes and had extended pressure in the Saskatoon zone, although the Blades narrowed that edge in the second half of the period.

The Wheat Kings extended the lead 34 seconds into the second period when Nguyen picked up the puck high in the Saskatoon zone, circled and beat veteran defenceman Siepmann in a race towards the net, snapping a shot between Gardner’s legs. His 19th goal of the season came in his 250th regular season game: Flamand’s assist on the goal extended his points streak to six games.

It took the hosts seven minutes to get their first shot as a pattern was established of the visitors dominating the first 10 minutes of the first two periods and the hosts taking over in the back 10.

The Wheat Kings made it 3-0 when Flamand won a battle for the puck and sent a weak shot at Gardner, that found its way through his legs and was knocked into the net by his pad as he searched for it.

That spelled the end of Gardner’s night, with Brandonite Ethan McCallum taking over in his first action against the Wheat Kings since a trade from the Medicine Hat Tigers on Oct. 28.

But the game was far from over for a Brandon team that’s occasionally given up goals in bunches. The Wheat Kings faced their first real adversity when they took back-to-back minors 10 and 12 minutes into the period that were separated by just three seconds. The Blades swarmed and finally sniped on the second power play when Scott found the puck off a rebound and had an open net behind Brandon goalie Alex Garrett.

The momentum had definitely changed, with Saskatoon scoring again 55 seconds later on a shot from the slot by Siepmann that beat Garrett through a maze of bodies in front.

Murray immediately called a timeout to prevent an outburst like the Swift Current Broncos had on Wednesday when they scored four times in eight minutes at Westoba Place en route to a 5-2 victory.

“I said not tonight,” Murray said. “Anybody who follows the team knows what happened against Swift Current the other night. We were up two (on Wednesday) and just said ‘Enough is enough, let’s dig in here fellas.’ I thought the first half of the first period was excellent, the second half not so much, and then the first half of the second period was excellent and five minutes to 10 minutes left in the period was poor.

“I just said ‘Let’s grab ahold of this here, we don’t want to lose the momentum. We worked hard to get a 3-0 lead, now we’re back down to one so let’s re-establish our game plan and get back to work.’”

His club apparently listened, because it was all Brandon in the third period, as they outscored Saskatoon 3-0 and outshot them 15-6.

“It was a real textbook third period,” Murray said. “I thought we played real well. We executed some good plays. It was nice to close it out and finish them off.”

The Wheat Kings restored the two-goal lead 2:13 into the third period on their first power play when Flamand picked up a second rebound and sent the puck into an empty net. With 7:19 remaining, Ronald was sent in down the wing by Flamand and he ripped a shot off the iron past McCallum for his first two-goal game in the WHL.

“It was really good to see,” Murray said of Ronald’s production. “Obviously the first one got us going and started the game off on the right foot, and he got the fifth one that kind of put the game out of reach. It was two really good shots.”

The Wheat Kings struck again on the power play late in the game when Baumuller snuck a low shot past McCallum to close out the scoring.

Garrett made 23 saves for the Wheat Kings in his hometown, with Gardner and McCallum combining to stop 29 shots for the Blades.

Brandon went 2-for-2 on the power play, with Saskatoon scoring once in two chances.

ICINGS: Brandon’s decimated lineup was once again without its two world junior players, goalie Carson Bjarnason (Canada) and forward Dominik Petr (Czechia), plus their injured corps of goalie Ethan Eskit (upper body, undetermined), forwards Roger McQueen (upper body, indefinite), Ben Binder Nord (upper body, week to week) and Easton Odut (upper body, week to week), and D Rhett Ravndahl (upper body, undetermined) … As a result, Brandon dressed prospects Cam Allard on defence and forward Prabh Bhathal up front … Saskatoon played its first game without fifth-year forward Brandon Lisowsky, who was traded to the Victoria Royals on Thursday … In its previous games in Saskatoon, the Wheat Kings lost 4-3 on Sept. 28 and won 4-2 on Dec. 15 … The teams have four games remaining but don’t see each other again until the Blades visit Brandon on Feb. 7 … Baumuller led the Wheat Kings with eight shots on net … The game took two hours, 19 minutes to play … In the faceoff circle, Saskatoon won 31-26 … Brandon visits the Prince Albert Raiders on Saturday, and then doesn’t see action again until the Portland Winterhawks come to Westoba Place on Friday, Jan. 10, the day after the trade deadline.

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