Rebels sink Wheat Kings in final game of road trip

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This article was published 11/12/2016 (3372 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

An eight-game road trip couldn’t end soon enough for the Brandon Wheat Kings.

The short-staffed, road-weary Wheat Kings dropped a 6-1 decision to the Red Deer Rebels at Enmax Centrium on Saturday.

Brandon (13-14-4-0), which played without injured forwards Tanner Kaspick, Nolan Patrick, Zach Russell and Linden McCorrister, was also without defenceman Kale Clague, who flew to Quebec earlier Saturday to join Team Canada’s training camp for the world junior championship.

Baron Thompson did return to the lineup after finishing up his three-game suspension on Friday in a loss to the Edmonton Oil Kings.

It’s been quite a stretch for the team, which went 1-6-1-0 on the road.

The Wheat Kings returned home after a 3-2 loss to the Saskatoon Blades on Nov. 25. Since leaving for Vancouver on Nov. 27, the Western Hockey League team has played seven games in 11 days while travelling more than 4,300 kilometres, not including the final 1,100 back to Brandon after the game.

Brandon head coach David Anning said a good first few minutes on Saturday were ruined by a pair of quick Red Deer goals.

“I liked our start and thought we had good energy,” he said. “I thought were able to get a couple of spins through each line and I think we had guys engaged. But you get scored on and then give up another one 45 seconds later, it took the wind right out of our sails. Right now we don’t have a lot of confidence, we’re fragile, and I think our response wasn’t good enough.”

The Rebels struck for the two goals 46 seconds apart six minutes into the first. The first came on a nice pass from the side of the net by Adam Musil to a wide-open Evan Polei, who quickly sent it by Brandon starting goalie Jordan Papirny. 

Soon after, a nice three-way passing play resulted in a Brandon Hagel goal, and six minutes later Michael Spacek made it 3-0. 

Caiden Daley drew the Wheat Kings back within a pair with his first WHL goal when he tipped home a James Shearer shot on a power play, and after Red Deer quickly took another penalty shortly after, Brandon pressed to get closer and seemed to have the momentum.

But a Stelio Mattheos tripping minor negated the power play, and soon after Red Deer defenceman Jared Freadrich managed to get a shot through from the point during four-on-four play to restore the Rebels’ three-goal lead.

In the second period, Hagel extended the lead with his second of the game, which came during the first half of a Daniel Bukac double minor.

Brandon Cutler closed out the scoring in the third period when he outmuscled Rylan Bettens to direct the puck through Papirny’s legs on a rush.

Red Deer improved to 16-12-3-2 and sits third in the Central Division.

“When things don’t go your way and you face adversity, you have to dig in and I don’t think that we did a great job of that,” Anning said. “And the penalties through 40 minutes, regardless of what the score was, took the momentum out of our game completely. We had seven minors through 40 minutes and many were careless and completely unnecessary. I didn’t think that helped us. When you’re on the road and give the other team the man advantage, you’re hurting your team game.”

Papirny made 32 saves, with Red Deer starting goalie Lasse Petersen of Swan River stopping 22 shots for Red Deer. 

ICINGS: The Wheat Kings fell to 4-10-2-0 on the road. They are 9-4-2-0 at home … Brandon dropped below .500 for the first time since they lost their season opener … Brandon scored five goals in their last six games on the trip … The Wheat Kings finally return to action at Westman Place on Friday when the Blades join them for teddy bear toss night.

» pbergson@brandonsun.com

» Twitter: @PerryBergson