Blades Get to Overtime, But Can’t Sustain All Positive Streaks With Shootout Loss to Rebels

A quick start ended in a disappointing result for the Saskatoon Blades Wednesday night.

Matthew Gard scored while Ben Riche hit a goal-post in Round 5 of the shootout, giving the Red Deer Rebels a 5-4 victory over the Bridge City Bunch before 3,332 fans at SaskTel Centre. The Blue and Gold jumped out to a 2-0 lead with Brandon Lisowsky becoming the 26th player in Blades’ history to collect 250 career points, scoring just 16 seconds into the game, before he set up Ben Riche. Saskatoon appeared to be on their way to a fourth straight win and a 10th consecutive home-ice success when they took a 3-1 lead into the third period. However, the Bridge City Bunch needed a Tyler Parr power goal, with goaltender Ethan McCallum on the bench for an extra attacker, to force overtime after Red Deer scored three times to take a 4-3 lead. By getting to a fourth period, the Blue and Gold kept two streaks alive while a couple of others came to an end. The Blades have yet to lose at home in regulation time this season, owning an 11-0-2 record, and haven’t lost in regulation time in their last 19 regular-season home games since March 1 of last season, going 17-0-2 in that time. Lisowsky, Riche and Parr all had a goal and an assist while Lukas Hansen also scored for 17-6-3 Saskatoon. Lisowsky’s goal was also the 134th of his W-H-L career, all with the Bridge City Bunch, moving him into a tie for seventh place on the Blue and Gold’s all-time goal-scoring list with current Rebels’ head coach Dave Struch. The Blades are off until a Saturday home game against the Calgary Hitmen at 7 p.m. Following are the audio highlights from CJWW’s broadcast, Post-Game Show comments from head coach Dan Da Silva and Lisowsky plus the official game summary courtesy the W-H-L…..

RED DEER Goals RED DEER PLAYERS (plus) SASKATOON PLAYERS (minus) Per. Time  G-As1-As2 1st 15:28  21-12-25 5 8 12 21 25 17 21 23 28 52 3rd 3:13 PP  13-11-5 3rd 6:38  5-15 5 8 13 14 15 2 17 23 24 28 3rd 14:12  2-9 2 4 9 11 26 2 17 23 24 28

SASKATOON Goals SASKATOON PLAYERS (plus) RED DEER PLAYERS (minus) Per. Time  G-As1-As2 1st :16  8-2-20 2 8 19 20 24 2 13 14 15 24 1st 12:36  19-8-13 8 13 19 20 21 5 9 12 21 25 2nd 12:58  28-4 2 4 28 36 86 3 4 11 25 26 3rd 18:41 PP  20-19-21