With one of the largest regular-season crowds in years filling Mosaic Place on Snowbird Night, the Moose Jaw Warriors decided to show off their overall team offence.
And oh, what a show it was.
Playing in front of well over 4,000 fans and facing the Regina Pats, the Warriors roared out to a 4-1 first period lead, led 7-3 through two and would go on to a 10-4 victory on Saturday night in Western Hockey League action.
Thing is, it wasn’t just a handful of players getting things done -- the Warriors had 10 different players score their 10 goals, and only a handful of players had multi-point games.
One of those was Denton Mateychuk, and the Warriors standout rearguard had a game for the ages, putting up six assists through the night. Mateychuk’s nine goals and 47 assists rank the 17-year-old 2022 NHL Draft prospect fourth in WHL defenceman scoring.
“I just think I just tried to keep my poise and let the play come to me,” Mateychuk said when asked what the key to his huge night was. “I’ve been trying to try to do that, not trying to force things and I think I did a really good job of it tonight. I didn't try and force anything, didn't make any plays that might have put a guy in a vulnerable position, just passing the puck away when I shouldn't. So I thought I did a pretty good job of that and got rewarded.”
Seeing nearly half the teams’ line-up score in the same game was also rewarding, especially to see so much balance from their line-up.
“We had four lines and three D pairings all going tonight, and when we have that, we can roll the lines and everybody's gonna produce,” Mateychuk said. “I think we did a great job of that, everybody was going. Everybody was in it from the start to the end and think when we do that, where we're a great team.”
The crowd was also a major factor -- the roof nearly came off Mosaic Place when Martin Rysavy scored only 3:45 into the game, and the Warriors fed off that energy the rest of the way.
It was a different story compared to their 5-0 shutout loss in Winnipeg earlier in the week.
“We knew we weren’t at our best and we learned from it during the couple days we had in practice,” Mateychuk said. “Then having a crowd like that, it was awesome and it’s nice when you have a good performance like that too.”
Rysavy’s opening goal came when the Czech import forced a turnover at the Warriors blueline and went in all alone on Regina’s Matthew KIeper, with the Pats netminder making the initial save. Rysavy was able to pick up the rebound right in front, though, and he showed soft hands in simply flipping it into the net.
Moose Jaw made it 2-0 with just over six minutes remaining in the first, and it was the product of a seeing-eyed cross-ice pass by Eric Alarie that found the absolute wrong guy for Regina all alone in the left face-off circle: Ryder Korczak had all day to get a shot off that beat Kieper five-hole.
Not a minute later, it was 3-0 Warriors as they took advantage of their first power play of the game. Captain Daemon Hunt took a feed from Jagger Firkus back to the blueline and got off a perfect one-timer that found the back of the Regina net.
Hunt appeared to suffer a leg injury in the third period after falling awkwardly on a big hit along the Regina end board. He was helped off the ice, with his status unknown as of yet.
Hunt’s goal was the end of the night for Kieper, as he was pulled in favour of Drew Sim after allowing three goals on nine shots.
Sim was tested quickly, and 2:12 after he took over, Atley Calvert did what Atley Calvert does, going hard to the net and poking home a puck Sim lost track of between his pads.
Regina’s Ty Spence got one back before the period was out, but the Warriors had the start they wanted.
Moose Jaw picked up right where they left off early in the second, this time when Calder Anderson broke in down the right wing, snared a Lucas Brenton pass out of the air, and got off a perfect shot top corner glove side with 1:23 gone.
Connor Bedard got that one back for Regina 22 seconds later, pounding home a rebound off his own shot at the top of the crease.
The flurries of goals continued exactly a minute after Bedard’s marker, this time when the Warriors’ Robert Baco went in on a breakaway and slipped a shot home five-hole for a 6-2 lead.
The offence calmed down for a few minutes after Baco scored, but Majid Khaddoura made it a five-goal Warrior edge with 9:58 remaining in the period, blasting a shot from the point top corner.
Cole Dubinsky closed out scoring in the second period for Regina, blasting a power play one-timer home with 3:24 remaining.
Alarie got things going in the third period for the Warriors, finishing off a tic-tac-toe passing play with Mateychuk and Rysavy 1:28 in.
Moose Jaw made it 9-3 when Brayden Yager scored at 8:49 and when Regina took a penalty on the goal celebration, Jagger Firkus scored another power play goal 1:36 later to give the Warriors their 10th marker from 10 different players.
Carl Tetachuk made 41 saves in the win, the Warriors had 16 shots on Sim in his 25:19 of work. Kieper returned for the final frame and finished with 11 saves.
The Warriors improved to 34-21-3-2 with the win and most importantly are now a single victory or Prince Albert loss away from clinching a playoff spot. They sit nine points back of Red Deer in fourth place in the Eastern Conference, three points up on Saskatoon.
Moose Jaw will have the next week off before hosting the aforementioned Blades on Saturday, Mar. 26. Game time is 7 p.m. at Mosiac Place.
