The Bonnyville Pontiacs suffered their first loss of the season on Friday night getting edged 3-2 by the visiting Sherwood Park Crusaders. The Pontiacs struggled out of the gate looking unprepared in the early going of the first period.
The Bonnyville Pontiacs suffered their first loss of the season on Friday night getting edged 3-2 by the visiting Sherwood Park Crusaders.
The Pontiacs struggled out of the gate looking unprepared in the early going of the first period.
The Crusaders took advantage of this slow start scoring under two minutes into the game when Daniel Wray sped down the right wing and blasted a shot over the left shoulder of Pontiacs' goaltender Stephen Klein.
The Pontiacs offense got a little momentum going, throwing quite a few shots toward the Crusaders goaltender in the first but couldn't find the back of the net.
A kneeing penalty by Locke Muller at the 6:54 mark of the first period shifted all of the momentum back to Sherwood Park.
The Crusaders wasted little time on the man advantage completely controlling the play deep in Pontiacs territory. Nicholas Jones struck first pouncing on a loss puck in the slot. Cameron Brezinski scored under a minute later and Sherwood Park had quickly jumped out in front 3-0.
Bonnyville head coach and GM Rick Swan was extremely unhappy with his teams "horrendous" start, feeling they were unprepared for the game.
"It is the will to prepare to win that separates good teams and the teams that are successful and we didn't prepare today," said Swan.
"One of the things that they have to understand is that it is a privilege to play for this organization. They have to take pride in their starts. They have to take pride in playing in this rink. They can't accept that type of start."
After the third Sherwood Park goal, Swan called a time out, pulled starting goaltender Stephen Klein and replaced him with AJHL rookie Josh Erikson.
The moved seemed to wake up the Pontiacs and they were able to get out of the period and into the intermission down by the three goals.
At 3:42 of the second period Pontiacs forward Luke Mahura found himself in alone behind the Crusaders defenders and made no mistake ripping a shot high glove on Sherwood Park goalie Tommy Nixon.
The goal gave the Pontiacs a little energy and they carried the play for the next few minutes before back-to-back penalties by Sean Mostrom and Redford Swan killed their momentum.
The Pontiacs found themselves taking quite a few penalties at bad times throughout the game, something Swan would like to see improved.
"You've got to be smart and today we weren't smart at times," said Swan. "It is discipline between the whistles and if they want consideration for ice time out there they've got to understand that not only do you have to hard but you've got to play smart."
The Pontiacs put up a fight in the final period, crashing the net several times in the frame.
Halfway through the final period Bonnyville's own Steen Paschinuk found a loose puck in the slot and shoveled it over Nixon, bringing the Pontiacs within a goal.
That was as close as Bonnyville got, as a goaltender interference penalty with 2:16 left in the game killed the comeback.
The lone bright spot in the win was the play of Pontiacs goaltender Erikson who stopped all 17 shots he faced in his AJHL debut.
"I think most importantly is you learn and you learn through wins and loses and here. We are in game three and it is our first bit of adversity where things didn't go our way and we caused that type of result," said Swan.
"We learned a valuable lesson here tonight. It is a sixty-minute game and in this league if you don't preform for sixty minutes you get a 3-2 loss and you lose two points."
Bonnyville will get a day off before taking on the Calgary Canucks at home on Sunday afternoon. Swan says there will be changes to the Pontiacs lineup.
"We are going to put different guys in the lineup, there is no question about that and it is going to be based upon the ones who were less prepared"
Bonnyville forward Jackson Dudley who missed Friday night's game with a jaw injury might be back in the lineup Sunday.
According to Swan, Dudley is experiencing some discomfort in his upper jaw and he will be forced to wear a cage for the next six weeks or so.
