The Red Deer Rebels’ penalty killers were cold-blooded killers Saturday night.
The Rebels’ short-handed units were outstanding against the Moose Jaw Warriors’ man-advantage crews, particularly in the crunch. Red Deer killed off three third-period infractions with the game on the line and emerged with a clutch 3-1 Western Hockey League victory in front of an official gathering of 4,811 at the Centrium.
Once a primary weakness of the Rebels, the penalty kill has come a long way over the past two months and now sits 10th overall in the league in success percentage. Saturday’s performance — against one of the WHL’s most potent power plays — was nothing short of impressive.
“It was huge, a real key for us,” said Rebels head coach Jesse Wallin, after watching the Warriors shoot blanks on five power-play opportunities.
“I thought we did a real good job of hounding the puck up ice tonight. That’s something we really tried to focus on and our guys did a real good job of that — of reading the situation and getting up ice before the puck got up there and paying good attention to detail.
“We didn’t allow them to get set up too much. Their power play is near the top of the league right now — they’re running at a pretty good (success) rate — so shutting them down was a real big key for us. We did a really good job in that area.”
The victory gave the Rebels a three-point cushion over the ninth-place Swift Current Broncos in the Eastern Conference. And eighth-place Red Deer is just a single point back of Moose Jaw and the Prince Albert Raiders, the latter of whom have played three more games than the Rebels.
“I think we all treated it like a playoff game. We came ready to work tonight and we did that,” said Red Deer forward Josh Cowen, who helped set up Landon Ferraro’s first of two third-period goals and was industrious on the penalty kill. “We had a really good atmosphere in the dressing room today. Everyone expected to have a good game and we all held each other accountable.”
Despite a strong start, the Rebels trailed 1-0 after one period as Moose Jaw captain Jason Bast connected with just three minutes and change remaining in the frame.
From there, however, it was mostly Red Deer, as John Persson beat Warriors netminder Jeff Bosch to the lower left corner exactly midway through the second period and Ferraro potted a pair of final-frame markers — his ninth and 10th goals of the season — to secure the Rebels’ 25th win of the season.
“I thought outside of the last six to seven minutes of the first period when we got a bit casual, a bit sloppy . . . it was a pretty good hockey game,” said Wallin. “I know the guys were excited to be back, we hadn’t played since last Sunday (5-1 loss at Chilliwack) and hadn’t played a home game in a couple of weeks. The guys were looking forward to getting back on the ice.”
The Rebels coaching staff made a correct decision in giving the players two days off earlier in the week.
“The rest allowed us to get our legs back after a tough road trip,” said Wallin. “That paid off for us tonight. We looked pretty fresh for the most part. It was a good team effort. We talked about that before the game — that we needed everybody on board, everybody doing things right. We needed everybody working together and supporting one another. I thought we had that tonight. It was a playoff-type game, a playoff-type atmosphere.”
The Rebels are idle until Wednesday when the Western Conference-leading Tri-City Americans visit the Centrium for a 7 p.m. start.
gmeachem@www.reddeeradvocate.com