Wheat Kings fall in triple OT

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This article was published 01/05/2022 (1404 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A season of almost unrelenting adversity ended dramatically for the Brandon Wheat Kings on Sunday as they fell 5-4 in triple overtime to the Red Deer Rebels in a wild Game 6 of their Eastern Conference quarterfinal series at Westoba Place.

The Rebels won the series 4-2 and will move on to face the Edmonton Oil Kings. The Winnipeg Ice and Moose Jaw Warriors meet in the other conference semifinal as the top four seeds advanced.

Jayden Grubbe was the overtime hero, with Ben King earning a hat trick and Arshdeep Bains adding a single for Red Deer. Goalie Chase Coward made 46 saves.

Brandon received two goals and an assist from Ridly Greig, with Rylen Roersma and Marcus Kallionkieli also scoring and graduating netminder Ethan Kruger blocking 50 shots in front of a crowd of 4,611.

Brandon head coach Don MacGillivray said if you take away Brandon’s 5-0 loss in the opener, the total goals in the six-game series were almost identical and so was the level of play.

“We went to triple overtime tonight and probably missed some opportunities that cost us the game but our guys battled like crazy all series long,” MacGillivray said. “It was a hard physical series and we gave Red Deer everything they could handle but they, unfortunately, came up on the right side.”

It didn’t take long for Red Deer to take the lead, with the visitors capitalizing just 50 seconds into the game.

A pair of Rebels won a battle for the puck near the Brandon net and Bains — the league’s regular-season scoring leader — emerged with the puck. He sent a pass out front to King, who was standing all alone and sent the first shot of the game past Kruger.

King added a second goal two minutes later on an outstanding no-look, backhand pass from Bains, who found King skating hard to the net and Red Deer’s top two players were off to the races.

Brandon’s first good opportunity came eight minutes into the period with the teams playing four-on-four. Defenceman Chad Nychuk was able to work his way through the Red Deer defensive pairing and get a shot on net that was stopped by Coward. On the ensuing faceoff, however, the puck landed just off the dot on Greig’s stick and he fired home his first goal of the playoffs.

Brandon, which was noticeably more engaged after their first goal, evened the game two minutes into the second period.

Nate Danielson carried the puck into the Red Deer zone and dropped it at the sideboards to Jake Chiasson, who threaded a pass across the zone down low to Roermsa, who was streaking towards the net and deflected it in.

Midway through the second period, King got his hat-trick goal on a feed from Jhett Larson off the rush to restore the Red Deer lead.

The Wheat Kings went to a relatively rare four-on-three power play 13:26 into the middle frame, but they cashed in on the five-on-four. After a Nolan Ritchie miss from down low, he backhanded the puck out front and Greig scored his second of the game to tie it 3-3.

On the next shift, however, Brandon simply couldn’t gain control of the puck in its zone as Red Deer’s top line pushed for the go-ahead goal, and Bains capitalized on the scramble play, restoring the lead just 47 seconds later.

Brandon tied the game again 2:38 into the third period when Kallionkieli jumped on a rebound created by a Nychuk wraparound attempt, deadlocking the teams at 4-4.

The Rebels had a late power-play opportunity but were unable to score, sending the game to overtime for the second time in the series.

Both teams played a little more cautiously than they had during the first 60 minutes, with a premium placed on just clearing the zone. Brandon outshot the visitors 10-8 in the fourth period, with none of them being incredible opportunities.

Both benches were shortened as time went on, and with the minutes adding up for both teams’ top players, the game inevitably slowed down and became less physical.

Brandon had the best opportunity of the second overtime when Red Deer’s Jace Isley took the first penalty called in 40 minutes, but Brandon was unable to score.

Red Deer had a good start to the sixth period but Carter Anderson’s tripping penalty, which was just a little obvious not to be called, sent Brandon back on the man advantage 2:56 into the period. Kallionkieli had a pair of very good chances but neither found the back of the net.

The end finally came 7:41 into the sixth period when Red Deer captain Grubbe jumped on the puck in the slot and fired it by a screened Kruger 7:41 into the sixth period.

“I saw (Christoffer) Sedoff rim it down behind the net and (Liam) Keeler and (Jace) Isley were down behind the net,” Grubbe said. “Keeler let it go to Isley and I screamed for it in front and he made a great pass right into the sweet spot so I put it home. It was pretty cool.”

On the other side of the ice, it was heartbreak.

“I’ve got no words,” Greig said after what will almost certainly be his final game as a Wheat King. “We battled back twice and then you get into double overtime, triple overtime, and anything can happen. It’s just unfortunate the way it ended.”

Brandon went 1-for-3 on the power play, with Red Deer unsuccessful in two chances.

Red Deer head coach Steve Konowalchuk, who was behind the bench with the Seattle Thunderbirds when Brandon beat them in 2016, said it was an outstanding six games.

“Man, what a tough series,” Konowalchuk said. “They got one overtime game, we got one overtime game, and overtime games obviously play such a factor in playoffs. I guess it’s nice it evened out that way … It sure feels good we got that but what a series.

“They played hard. Actually both teams, I think even looking back to my years coaching in Seattle, we had some good playoffs runs but I don’t remember two teams going toe to toe as long as these guys did.”

MacGillivray saw it the same way. He liked how his team played, even if they came up just a little short.

“I’m proud of our team,” MacGillivray said. “They competed hard, they battled, they played like old-time hockey and we gave ourselves a chance to win every game other than the first game when I felt like we played OK but not quite good enough.”

ICINGS: Brandon skated without injured forward Zakhar Polshakov, plus healthy scratches D Owen Harris, D Zach Turner, F Jesiah Bennett, F Roger McQueen, Ben Thornton and F Hayden Chaloner … Backup goalie Carson Bjarnason gloved a puck that deflected into the Brandon bench, and after unsuccessfully trying to give it back to a linesman, tossed it into the crowd … Greig led the Wheat Kings with 12 shots on net … The game took four hours 16 minutes to play … In the faceoff circle, Brandon won 54-50 … In the Western Conference, the Portland Winterhawks, Seattle Thunderbirds and Kamloops Blazers have advanced to the semifinals. They are awaiting the winner between the first-place Everett Silvertips and eighth-place Vancouver Giants, a series Vancouver leads 3-2. Game 6 is set for Monday with a potential Game 7 on Wednesday.

» pbergson@brandonsun.com

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