The Moose Jaw Warriors are back in the win column.
Steady pressure right from puck drop and six straight goals in the second period led to the Warriors taking a 9-4 victory to open the U.S. Division portion of their eight-games-in-14-day Western Hockey League road trip.
The win snapped a three-game losing streak, and Moose Jaw improved to 35-19-0-3, moving into a tie for second place in the Eastern Conference with the Medicine Hat Tigers and remaining four points clear of fourth-place Swift Current.
The Americans took only 43 seconds to get on the board, when Tri-City’s Parker Bell scored on their first rush up the ice and on their first shot of the game.
Some hard work and alert play along the end boards led to the Warriors tying things up two minutes later. Brayden Schuurman won a puck battle behind the net and sent a quick pass to Rilen Kovacevic, who in turn fired a pass into the slot for Martin Rysavy and a quick shot later tied the game 1-1.
Matthew Savoie began what would turn into an impressive night with 8:05 gone in the period, and it was a good example of his stature as a player who can create sudden scoring chances. The Buffalo Sabres first rounder stole the puck from an Americans defender at the Tri-City blue-line, broke in one-on-one and used the screen to put a perfect shot top shelf glove side.
The Warriors began to run into penalty trouble late in the period, but ended up with the better scoring chances.
Kovacevic forced a blueline turnover and went in on a breakaway but couldn’t score, and shortly after the Warriors took another minor, a scramble in front of the Tri-City net led to a handful of chances, only for Moose Jaw to take yet another penalty.
That trouble carried over into the second period, and Bell scored his second of the game on the power play 32 seconds into the frame.
Bell then finished off his hat trick with a short handed goal just over two minutes later, but the Warriors would get that one back on the same penalty.
Their league-best work on the man advantage led to Brayden Yager scoring on a shot from the right face-off circle after some slick puck work by Savoie and Jagger FIrkus.
Yager nearly had his second of the game five minutes into the period when he had a shot at the wide-open net, only for the puck to go high. There would be no such bad luck for Connor Schmidt at the 7:13 mark, though, as his shot from the point found its way past Lukas Matecha for the 4-3 lead.
The Warriors kept the pressure up, and things suddenly went their way in dramatic fashion.
Atley Calvert extended his point streak to 15 games with his 38th goal of the season at 9:28, and Savoie made it 6-3 only 23 seconds later thanks to a perfect feed to the side of the net on the rush by Lynden Lakovic.
The goal was Savoie’s fourth point of the game and 22nd point in 12 games since joining the Warriors just after the World Juniors.
Five minutes later, he had his fifth point, picking up a loose puck behind the net and feeding a pass out front for Rysavy’s second of the game and a 7-3 lead.
Yager then capped one of their best periods of the season with five seconds remaining, breaking down his wing and putting a perfect backhand shot upstairs short side for his 27th of the season.
Firkus continued his quest to become the first WHLer to reach 100 points with his 42nd goal of the season 4:38 into the third period. The goal, combined with his assist earlier in the night gave the Seattle Kraken prospect 98 points on the campaign.
Former Warrior Thomas Tien scored for Tri-City to wrap up scoring, with Moose Jaw Minor Hockey product Ethan Peters picking up an assist on the play with 2:19 remaining.
Unger capped his night with 23 saves while Matecha had 20 saves in 29:45 before giving way to former Warriors prospect Kyle Kelsey, who had 14 stops the rest of the way.
The Warriors play game four of the road swing on Saturday night in Spokane against the Chiefs.
