The Red Deer Rebels got what they deserved on Saturday night.
Trailing for most of the game, Red Deer wasn’t able to generate much offensive pressure and in the end it caught up with them.
The Saskatoon Blades came into Saturday night as one of the worst scoring teams in the WHL, but managed to notch four in a 4-1 victory over the Rebels.
About the only positive for Red Deer was goalie Ethan Anders, who stopped 34 shots in the loss.
“It wasn’t good, outside of our goalie give me one player on our team that played close to what we expect,” Rebels GM/head coach Brent Sutter said of the loss.
“It was terrible. Right through our whole lineup. I give Saskatoon credit, but come on, let’s not kid ourselves. It doesn’t matter who our opponent was tonight, we weren’t even close to the level we have to play at.”
Saskatoon’s Braylon Shmyr opened the scoring early in the first and Red Deer wasn’t able to tie the game until the opening minute of the third when Grayson Pawlenchuk scored his sixth goal of the season on a breakaway.
From there, the Rebels pushed back, but a long wrist shot eluded Anders who was otherwise solid, midway through the third and that appeared to take the life out of the Red Deer bench.
“Someone has to step up. I thought maybe the goal early in the third would give us some momentum and it maybe did for four or five minutes,” Sutter said.
“Kept the game close but, two or three shifts later we got hemmed in our own zone and no one was finishing checks. We were just flat out bad.”
Chase Wouters added a third Blades goal when he beat Ethan Sakowich wide and slide a shot underneath Anders pad late in the final frame.
Libor Hajek added another Saskatoon late in the third.
The Rebels will welcome the Calgary Hitmen to town on Oct. 20 for their next contest.
Email sports tips to Byron Hackett
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