In their win over the Moose Jaw Warriors, the Wheat Kings pulled away with an offensive outburst in the third period. In their game against the Swift Current Broncos, neither team scored in the third and that suited the Wheat Kings just fine.
Luke Shipley scored shorthanded, and Alex Garret was excellent again with 31 saves as the Wheat Kings took a 3-1 victory. Joby Baumuller and Marcus Nguyen also scored in the critical win.
“The first ten or twelve minutes of the game we gave up a couple of odd-man rushes and breakaways, and Garrett stood tall,” said head coach and GM Marty Murray. “I thought we settled in. We took too many penalties, that’s a dangerous power play to be giving up six, but at the same time we did a good job of keeping them to the outside.”
The Broncos tried to stretch the ice out throughout the first period, and eventually succeeded. A two-on-one between Carlin Dezainde and Clarke Caswell was partially broken up, but Caswell followed up his own pass and lifted it to the back of the net.
Late in their second power play of the period, the Wheat Kings answered. Luke Shipley and Nolan Flamand worked a perfect zone entry, capped off by Flamand firing it to the left circle where a waiting Baumuller one-timed it past Joey Rocha.
After killing a Broncos power play, the Wheat Kings seized the lead. Dylan Ronald flipped the puck down the ice for Nguyen to skate onto, and when Nguyen caught up to it he backstopped so quickly his checker couldn’t keep up. Walking to the middle, Nguyen picked his spot and popped the water bottle on Rocha.
While shorthanded, the Wheat Kings pushed their lead to 3-1. Carter Klippenstein bounced it off the boards to Shipley with a slick drop pass, and Shipley made no mistake from the top of the right circle.
Both teams had a power play in the third period, but the score didn’t budge one bit. Garrett was stellar again down the stretch for the Wheat Kings, and the team in front of him sold out to block shots whenever needed to preserve the lead.
When the Broncos pulled the goaltender, the Wheat Kings held them off again. And though he couldn’t get loose from his check to score a goal, Baumuller won a battle to drive the puck into the Broncos’ zone and drew a penalty doing it, effectively putting the game out of reach.
The win moves the Wheat Kings four points up on the Broncos, but they can’t enjoy it for long. They’re back to work against the Broncos on New Years Day at 2:00, this time on home ice.
