Early in the game, an undermanned Red Deer Rebels squad put a bit of a scare into the Brandon Wheat Kings. They responded to that scare with an offensive explosion.
Luke Shipley, Jaxon Jacobson, Quinn Mantei, Jordan Gavin, Marcus Nguyen, Nicholas Johnson, and Carter Klippenstein scored, as the Wheat Kings took the 7-2 win. Carson Bjarnason held up his end of the bargain with 29 saves. Shipley finished with five points.
“The first period was kind of a coach’s nightmare,” said head coach and GM Marty Murray. “Coming off the road trip, it’s a little like that first game after the Christmas break, you never know what you’re going to get and it’s a hangover more often than not. The first period wasn’t pretty by any means but we found a way to get out tied, which was huge. Our decisions and execution were a lot better in the second, which allowed us to pot a few.”
It was a quick strike by the Rebels that opened the scoring. Jhett Larson broke in up the right wing and his rapid release, which may have ridden a Wheat King stick, went straight to the top corner.
At the other end, the Wheat Kings responded with a top-corner shot of their own. Jacobson fed the puck out front from the left wing corner, and Shipley had room to walk in and pick his spot for his 13th.
After killing most of the Rebels’ first power play of the game, the Wheat Kings surrendered the go-ahead goal in the back half of it. Ty Coupland collected a puck at the left circle and quickly snapped it past Bjarnason.
Late in the first, the Wheat Kings managed to square the score and keep the surprisingly offensively explosive first period going. Mantei led the rush and backhanded it to Jacobson in the slot, and despite not having a lot of time or space, Jacobson cleanly beat Chase Wutzke bar-down.
Mantei gave the Wheat Kings their first lead of the night early in the second. With Carter Klippenstein setting the screen, Mantei snapped one through traffic that Wutzke got a piece of, but not enough.
After weathering a storm of back-to-back Red Deer power plays, the Wheat Kings cashed in on one of their own. Jacobson dangled his way to the far corner and fed it back across the crease to Gavin for the tap-in.
The final tally of the second period flurry came from the Wheat Kings top line. Nolan Flamand won a battle in front, found the rebound of a Shipley shot, and hooked it over to Nguyen who slapped it into the nearly open net.
An early third period power play saw the Wheat Kings stretch their lead again. Johnson and Flamand worked a give-and-go, which ended with Johnson rifling a shot off the post and past Wutzke for the 6-2 lead.
Yet another Wheat King got in on the act late in the third. Dominik Petr found a rebound in front and rather than throw it on goal he dished it off to Klippenstein who calmly slid it in.
From there, the Wheat Kings went into cruise control mode and took the 7-2 win. Next up: a Saskatchewan road trip with stops in Moose Jaw and Regina, beginning Friday night against the Warriors.
