The St. Paul Junior B Canadiens had its best weekend of the season with a 6-3 win in Vermilion on Friday, but blew a two-point lead for a 6-5 overtime loss at home on Sunday.
“We finally got some offensive lines working together,” said head coach Tony Meger, adding that the team still had some trouble in its own zone. “Things are coming together. It’s looking a lot better.”
Three recently added players contributed to the strong showing, Jelani Whitstone from Cold Lake, Buddy Morin from Prince Albert and Jordan MacWilliams from Vegreville. Whitstone earned four points in the two weekend games.
Skylar Giroux got the Canadiens on the board within the first minute of play against the Vermilion Tigers. The Tigers evened it up not long after, but with an unassisted goal from Whitstone the Canadiens again took the lead.
The Tigers matched it in the second, but the Canadiens dominated the third with two goals from Justin Funk, one from Justin Dubeau and another from Whitstone. Brett Romanovich earned three assists, with Mackenzie Trach, Whitstone and Jesse Parenteau helping with one apiece.
“Todd Pooke bailed us out of a lot of mistakes in our own zone,” he said, crediting the goaltender in Friday’s game. Canadiens were out shot 47-20.
On Sunday, the Canadiens hit the ice strong against the Killam Wheat Kings, with Morin scoring after a minute of play, assisted by Giroux and Tanner Jaman. Killam took the lead toward the bottom of the first, but Funk scored, assisted by Whitstone, to even it up going into the second.
The Canadiens took the lead again in the second, courtesy of Giroux and assisted by Morin. Another from Brandon Cantre with an assist from Funk gave the Canadiens the two point lead.
Two points from the Wheat Kings evened it up going into the third. Trach scored early in the third on the power play with an assist from Whitstone to give the Canadiens the 5-4 lead, but Killam scored again and the tie held until the end of the period.
In a five-minute four-on-four overtime, Killam scored with 2:30 left for the win.
The Canadiens ran into penalty trouble in the third, with eight penalties, and suffered from 32 penalty minutes in the game. Three of Killam’s point came courtesy of power plays.
The team will have to improve its discipline, said Meger. The Canadiens plan to work on its penalty kill and power play in the coming weeks.
“We did really well in both these games,” said Meger, crediting goalie Miguel Christensen for the team’s strong performance on Sunday. “We’ve got to be better in our defensive zone with the penalty kill and we’ve got to take advantage of power plays.”
The Canadiens travel to Cold Lake on Friday and will host Lloydminster on Saturday.
The Saddle Lake Junior B Warriors dropped to the bottom of the nine-team North Eastern Alberta Hockey League over the weekend with two losses.
The Lloydminster Bandits dominated 15-0 in Saddle Lake on Saturday.
