Regina Pats 4 Red Deer Rebels 1
The Regina Pats like to score. A lot.
Before Saturday, the Pats had scored 52 goals in their last ten games, including a streak of seven games with at least five goals.
Regina also showed off their league leading 33.3 percent power play, scoring twice in the first period on the man advantage. From there, Red Deer was just never able to mount a comeback.
“Obviously, not good enough,” Rebels GM and head coach Brent Sutter said about the performance.
“Not a great first period at all, I thought we did a lot of standing around. Showed way too much respect. We chased the whole period. What happens with that is you spend a lot of time having turnovers. You take a bad penalty, specialty teams weren’t good enough in the first period. We got two power play goals against, second was better, as bad as the first was it’s 3-1 and we have a five on three and we don’t capitalize on it.”
Down 3-0 in the second, Rebels captain Adam Musil scored on the power play to give the home side a little bit of life. The goal was the 18th of the season for the St. Louis draft pick.
At the end of the day, falling behind against one of the league’s best squads was too tall a task.
“They’re the number one team in the league,” Musil said.
“They have solid forwards, solid D and we knew they were a good team but we just had to play our game and we need to do that for 60 minutes. We have to be more prepared for next game.”
Pats goalie Tyler Brown earned first star honours as he turned aside 31 shots on the night, including two highlight reel saves on a five on three early in the third period.
Adam Brooks scored twice for the Pats, but league leader point producer Sam Steel was held pointless for only the sixth time this season and the first in eight games.
Sutter added that on top of showing too much respect for the Pats, his best players simply weren’t dominant on Saturday.
“We gave up way too much time and space,” Sutter said.
“When you have games at this time of year, your best players have to be your best players. I though Spac’s line struggled tonight. It was tough to get matchups. Our best players have to play against their best. I thought one of their top two lines outplayed Spac’s line most of the night, so it hurt us. I thought Musil’s line was really good.”
Rebels defenceman Alex Alexeyev was hurt in the third period after he got tangled up with a Pats’ forward. There was no update on the injury after the game but Sutter said, “It doesn’t look good”.
The game was also the first time that trade deadline acquisitions Lane Zablocki and Dawson Barteaux played against their former team. It was the first time back in Red Deer for former Rebels Jeff de Wit and Josh Mahura.
The Rebels are back on the ice at home against Lethbridge Hurricanes on Wednesday.