The Yorkton RawTec Maulers marched into Swift Current鈥檚 Credit Union iPlex on Saturday for a pair of games against the Legionnaires and matched out with a pair of victories, 3-2 on Saturday night and 5-3 on Sunday afternoon to improve their record to 13-9-3.
The two wins five the RawTec Maulers 29 points, good enough for seventh place in the 12-team SMAAAHL, just one back of the sixth place Saskatoon Contacts (14-8-2, 30 points) and two points behind the fifth place Prince Albert Mintos (13-6-5, 31 points).
The Tisdale Trojans (18-3-2) continue to lead the SMAAAHL with 38 points, while the Notre Dame Hounds (18-5-0) are second with 36 points and the Regina Pat Canadians (17-5-1) sit in third with 35 points.
The Battlefords Stars round out the top four with a 17-7-0 record and 34 points, just five ahead of the RawTec Maulers.
Comeback Saturday
They might not have been jetlagged, but the Yorkton RawTec Maulers sure were buslagged for the first 40 minutes of Saturday鈥檚 game in Swift Current as the host Legionnaires carried the flow of play for the first two periods, outscoring the Maulers 2-1 in the first period on goals by Jarett Gerlach and Tristan Hermanson, while Koal Roberts could muster just one in response for Yorkton through 40 minutes of play.
The Legionnaires also outshot the Maulers 27-13 over two periods, however Yorkton netminder Rylan Palchewich, back after missing several games with a hip flexor injury, stood tall to keep his team to within one.
The Maulers rewarded their goaltender in the third period as they quickly turned the momentum around when diminutive forward Derrick Budz scored his fourth goal of the campaign to tie the game at two.
The Mauler domination continued soon after, however Swift Current goaltender Chantz Vinck proved why he鈥檚 a starter in the SMAAAHL, thwarting each and every Mauler attack.
That is, until Yorkton鈥檚 Kylan Shea put the puck past Vinck with just over a minute remaining in the game for his second goal of the season and the eventual game winner.
Palchewich picked up the win, his first since October 26, turning aside 31-of-33 Swift Current shots while Vinck shouldered the loss, stopping 29-of-32 RawTec Mauler opportunities and while it was a team game, the play of Palchewich early on was key to the Maulers picking up the victory. 鈥淧alchewich came back after he鈥檚 missed quite a while with an injury and had a really strong game and kept us in it and gave us a chance,鈥� offered RawTec Mauler head coach Dan Cross. 鈥淥bviously in the third period we came out and dominated them and ended up winning in regulation which was nice but he came out and had a strong game and definitely one of the reasons that we won was because of his strong performance.鈥�
Turning the power on
In their last five games the Yorkton RawTec Maulers鈥� powerplay was 1-for-32, or roughly 3%.
On Sunday, however, the Maulers went 3-for-6 for a 50% success rate to power themselves to a 5-3 win over the Swift Current Legionnaires.
McKenzie Welke gave Yorkton the lead late in the first period when he became the first Mauler to hit double digits in goals with his 10th of the year.
An Evan Armstrong interference penalty with just over a minute left gave the Maulers the man advantage, resulting in something that they have not been able to do all December long: a powerplay goal when Brennan Watson beat Vinck for his fifth of the campaign with just three seconds left in the period to give Yorkton a 2-0 lead after one period of play.
The RawTec Maulers upped their lead to three just four minutes into the second period when Logan Casavant, with Swift Current鈥檚 Tanner Brewster in the penalty box for slashing, found the back of the net for his first of three on the afternoon.
A trio of Legionnaire goals, one in the second period (Kevin Bendall) and two in the third (Bryce Hall, Caleb Griffin) drew the home side even, however another Casavant powerplay goal gave the Maulers their second and final lead of the game.
An empty-net goal with three seconds remaining capped the hattrick game off for Casavant and sealed the deal for the Maulers. Final score: Yorkton five Swift Current three.
Carter Phair backstopped the RawTec Maulers to their 13th win of the season; something that the Maulers were unable to do last season until February 11. And although the goaltending is key to their success, head coach Dan Cross feels that it鈥檚 only one part of what is making this Mauler team successful. 鈥淥ur goaltending is phenomenal but not only that, there are lots of exciting things happening,鈥� suggested Cross. 鈥淲e鈥檝e got a young line up, our powerplay seems to have found its groove, our goaltending is solid and both guys had strong games so we can rely on both of them to backstop us there.
鈥淵eah we鈥檝e run into some injury and sickness problems here but it doesn鈥檛 seem to matter who we put in net there, we can always count on whoever it is to give us a strong performance back there. It looks good, really good because we have a real high tempo, we play a physical style of game and I think we鈥檙e one of those hard teams to play.鈥�
That high tempo, physical style of play was highlighted on Sunday by Mauler rookie forward Logan Casavant and his hattrick. A hattrick that head coach Cross calls 鈥榮neaky鈥�. 鈥淗e was around the net and one went off his skate, then he got a rebound for another one and then he got the empty netter and the guys were looking around and were basically like 鈥榦h, I guess that鈥檚 three!鈥�,鈥� smiled Cross, continuing, 鈥淪o he didn鈥檛 do anything flashy, it wasn鈥檛 a flashy hat-trick, it was a hard working one.
He was going to the right places, getting in the right spot, banging around and obviously he had a strong game and put himself in the position and situation to get those goals.鈥�
Next up
The next action for the Yorkton RawTec Maulers will be Thursday when the visit the Tisdale Trojans.
They鈥檒l then be on the road this weekend for a pair of games against the Saskatoon Contacts in the hopes of leapfrogging the Saskatoon club in the standings.
