Wranglers 4 Vipers 1
What would a Red Deer Vipers-Blackfalds Wranglers series be without a little bad blood?
There was certainly no love lost between the two teams on Wednesday at the Red Deer Arena, where the Wranglers roped a 4-1 win to take a 2-0 series in the best-of-seven Heritage Junior B Hockey League North Division final.
The Wranglers were enjoying every minute of their triumph at the final buzzer, while the Vipers players were clearly frustrated and disgusted.
“That’s the way it should be. You’re wearing different coloured jersey which means you go as hard as you can,” said Vipers coach Brian Renaud, who recently replaced Lloyd Shaw behind the bench.
“There’s always been a rivalry there,” said Wranglers long-time bench boss Brian Lenz. “Players from both teams might sit in the bar together and talk about it and then go battle on the ice. That’s the way it should be.”
The Wranglers led 2-0 after one period and 3-1 after 40 minutes and outshot the Vipers 43-29 overall, making for a relatively easy evening as compared to Game 1 of the series, a 5-4 Wranglers’ win at Blackfalds.
“We had a tougher battle in the first game than we did tonight for some reason,” said Lenz. “We played a little better tonight defensively, which was the big thing. And Tanner (goaltender Schalin) played very well for us.
“If we can continue with the way we played tonight I think we can finish them. It’s going to be a tough battle. They’re a good hockey team and we want to get the series over with as soon as we can.”
Jason Bell scored twice for the Wranglers, who got additional goals from Chance Abbott and Jared Williams. Jeffery Kohut notched the lone Vipers goal.
Schalin made 27 saves, while Travis Weber turned aside 35 shots in the Red Deer net.
The series continues on Saturday at 8 p.m. at the Red Deer Arena, where the Vipers will require a big-time performance to get back into contention.
“We have to get back to Viper hockey,” said Renaud. “We let these guys get under our skin tonight. You have to come out hard at home and we didn’t do that, we didn’t come to the rink with the intensity we needed. We didn’t do the little things right. They (Wranglers) did and they deserved the win. We didn’t deserve to win tonight.”
Game 4 of the series is scheduled for Sunday at 2 p.m. at Blackfalds.
gmeachem@www.reddeeradvocate.com