Kenneth Brown
of The Clarion
The Kindersley Sr. Klippers have suffered their first loss of the season and coach Matt Glencross says he believes the team could benefit from the experience.
Kindersley went into action this past weekend with a perfect 14-0 record. The team played two road games starting with a win on Jan. 12 against the Luseland Mallards, and moving on to the team’s first loss of the season on Jan. 13 against the Macklin Mohawks.
Macklin has played well against Kindersley this season. The Mohawks have played the Sr. Klippers three times so far, and they have yet to lose a game in regulation. Kindersley won the first two games in a shootout and overtime.
[emember_protected for=”2″ custom_msg=’For more on this story, please see this week’s print edition of The Clarion.’]
The Sr. Klippers are still in first place overall with a record of 15-1 and 30 points. The Wilkie Outlaws are in second place with a record of 11-1-2 and 24 points, but Wilkie has two games in hand over Kindersley. The league’s top two teams will play each other two more times before the season ends.
Kindersley lost by a score of 5-3 in Macklin on Sunday, but the score includes an empty net goal for the Mohawks. The Sr. Klippers were up 3-1 until late in the second period when the Mohawks’ Spencer Bast scored the first of his three goals on the night to cut the lead to 3-2.
Macklin would go on to score the only three goals of the third period including Bast’s empty net goal with 17 seconds left in the game. Johnny Calkins, Kyle Donaldson and Brody Ryberg scored for the Sr. Klippers Luke Sproule stopped 32-36 shots in the loss.
Kindersley had a better fate in Luseland a night earlier. The Sr. Klippers defeated the Mallards by a score of 8-5 in what was the final meeting of the regular season for the teams at opposite ends of the standings.
Shane Radomske got the start in Luseland and it was his first action of the season. Radomske stopped 30 of 35 shots to pick up the win for Kindersley. The team’s big scorers in the win were Donaldson with five points (2G, 3A) and Landon Longmire with four points (2G, 2A).
Austin Galipeau and Jesse Ismond both had three-point games. Galipeau and Ismond each had a goal and two assists in Luseland. Calkins and Byron Ismond scored the team’s other goals and Calkins pitched in an assist for a two-point game.
According to the team’s coach, the team’s bench was shorter for the Macklin game than in several of its games this season. Glencross said the team was down two of its top nine forwards and one of its top six defencemen for the game. Short bench or not, he said the lineup is not an excuse and Macklin played a good game.
“It was a good game,” he said, adding that he believes the lineup Macklin had for its two most recent games against Kindersley has only been on the ice together about four times this season. “It was a fast game.”
Glencross said it was tough for either team to build momentum because there were several penalties on both sides. Both teams had a 5-on-3 power play, and neither team could score. The empty net goal sealed the deal for Macklin, he said.
The coach said the Mohawks are a top-three team in the SWHL with the right mix of players in the lineup. He noted that the team was unbeaten in 15 games this season, so the team needs to move on and get back to work. The loss could help the team as an important learning experience.
“As long as we learn from it, I think we’ll be okay,” Glencross said, recognizing that the loss will allow the team to press the reset button before its final regular season games. “If we don’t learn from it, we’ll get ourselves in trouble.”
Penalties were not a factor on Saturday in Luseland because there was only one penalty called in the game. Luseland had an interference penalty in the third period, but it was the only penalty and Kindersley did not score on the power play. Glencross said it was a road game and the team got out with a win.
[/emember_protected]
