No horror show
Rebels 2 Ice 1
There’s nothing about Friday the 13th that Red Deer Rebels head coach Jesse Wallin doesn’t like.
His son was born on that day and Friday his team snapped a three-game Western Hockey League losing streak with a 2-1 victory over the Kootenay Ice before an announced crowd of 5,501 at the Centrium.
The Rebels even got a few bounces go their way, something that hasn’t been happening much of late as they’ve struggled to snap out of a slump that saw them lose seven-of-eight games prior to Friday.
The biggest break, or call, came with 2.2 seconds remaining in the game when referee Derek Herman waved off a Kootenay goal, ruling the net was dislodged prior to the puck going into the Red Deer net.
“Standing on the bench watching the play go down it seemed to be the way the bounces have been going for us of late,” said Wallin. “They have the puck 200-feet away from our net with 10 seconds remaining. They get the puck into our end and we turn it over as one of our defenceman falls, then one of our forwards falls going after the loose puck.”
As a result there was a wild scramble at the side of Red Deer goaltender Darcy Kuemper and as the net slid off the puck went in.
“But finally we got a break going our way,” said Wallin.
Kootenay head coach Mark Holick said he couldn’t tell if the net was off prior to the puck going in, but he wasn’t overly upset with the ruling.
“You take whatever you get,” he said. “Derek (Herman) was in a tough spot. He was going to upset someone. He was going to have 4,000 people mad or 22. But it was a bang-bang play, so what can you do.
“Besides when you only play 20 minutes you’re not going to win. Red Deer played better than we did. We’re obviously hoping for a break at the end but you work for your breaks and we didn’t work and didn’t deserve to win.”
Holick said his team came into the game a little overconfident.
“I think we think we’re better than we are,” he said. “The thing is we don’t win if we don’t work . . . tonight we got what we deserved it was a simple as that.”
Although they were outshot over the opening 40 minutes the Rebels more than held their own and deserved to be ahead 2-1 after 40 minutes, Red Deer’s Carter Smith and Willie Coetzee sandwiched goals around a power-play marker by Drew Czerwonka in the second period to provide all the offence the Rebels needed.
“We did score twice, it’s been tough to win when you’re getting one or zero,” said Wallin, who gave the Ice credit for limiting the number of shots against.“They do a good job of blocking shots and getting their sticks in the way,” he said.
The Ice held a 17-14 edge in shots after 40 minutes then outshot the Red Deer crew 17-3 in the final 20 minutes.
The Rebels got caught sitting back in the third period.
“You could see the inexperience in our group. We haven’t been in that situation much this season . . . not enough anyway,” said Wallin. “We got back on our heels and were a bit tentative. We quit skating, forechecking and started turning pucks over.
“But overall the guys worked hard and we’ve been on the wrong end of those enough this year it felt good to get a bounce go the right way for a change.”
Kuemper was outstanding, finishing with 33 saves while the Rebels had 17 shots on Kootenay netminder Todd Matthews.
Contact Danny Rode at drode@reddeeradvocate.com
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