A step in the right direction. That was the consensus for the Lloydminster Lancers on Sunday night as they secured their first point of the U18 AAA hockey season.
In their home-opener at the new Cenovus Energy Hub, the Lancers ran into late penalty trouble and lost 5-4 in overtime to the Sherwood Park Kings.
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After opening the regular season with a 6-3 loss to the Leduc Oil Kings the day before, Lloydminster showed more of its potential in Sunday’s showdown. Not to mention picking up a point, an early boost for an organization that finished last in the Alberta Elite Hockey League last season.
“Yeah, yesterday didn’t go our way, the way we wanted it to,” said Rhett Romanchuk, the Lancers’ new captain. “Neither did today, but I was happy with the way we kind of battled back. Obviously, you want to win, but I think it’ll come. We’ve just got to trust the process.”
The six-foot-four Romanchuk is among just four players back from last year’s Lancers, now under the leadership of new head coach Chris King.
It’s a work in progress for Lloydminster, which fought back twice in the third period to force overtime, but did so the hard way. The Lancers were penalized for the final 5:17 of regulation and were two men short for 1:06 during that stretch. They were still shorthanded 30 seconds into overtime when Landon Horiachka, with his second goal of the game, ripped a hard shot past Lloyd’s newest goaltender, Asher Ammann.
Despite the worthy performances of Ammann and the rest of the Lancers’ penalty killers, they finally succumbed to Sherwood Park’s pressure on the first shift of overtime, with just nine seconds left in Denton Setzer’s boarding penalty.
Setzer was penalized with 1:21 remaining in the third period and 1:06 left in a major penalty to Dalin Hannah, who also received a game misconduct for his check from behind against Dax Derocher.
“Yeah, that’s tough,” said Romanchuk, the towering defenceman. “It’s still U18 hockey and some calls aren’t going to go your way. Some hits are just a little too hard, but you’ve just got to kill ’em off and battle through it.”
‘SHOWED A LOT OF RESILIENCE’
Coach King liked much of what he saw from his Lancers in Sunday’s game, but he wasn’t happy that their undisciplined penalties compromised those comeback efforts in the late going.
“I thought we showed a lot of resilience — which is one of the boys’ keywords — in the third, but we just can’t be in the box that much,” said King, describing those infractions as “dumb” penalties.
“Those are just mistakes that kill you. We end up killing for eight straight minutes. We did a great job of staying in the game and getting a point, but eventually they made a great shot (to win it).
“Asher was phenomenal in net. He really held us in there, with the amount of shots that he faced on the power play. But you can’t play like that and expect to win in this league. The margin is so slim in this league.”
The Lancers carried the play in the first period but trailed 2-1 afterward. They regressed in the second and fell behind 3-1.
As part of a spirited third-period comeback, Lloydminster rookies Hannah, Kael Scott and Graydon Kvill each scored their first U18 goals. Scott had a two-point night. Kvill’s shot from the point with 6:18 left evened the score at 4-4.
The Lancers’ opening goal came on the power play from second-year forward Connor Nickle, showing Nathan MacKinnon-like speed and skill with an end-to-end rush and a nifty deke to score against Hayden Rinas.
Romanchuk and Ammann — the Lloyd goaltending recruit from Edmonton — earned assists on Nickle’s second goal of the season.
Both goalies faced 34 shots on the night.
Ryan Van Iperen scored a power-play goal and added two assists for Sherwood Park. Matthew Simpson, shorthanded, and Zak Stabbler had the Kings’ other goals.
The visitors might have had even more offence if not for the penalty-killing by Carson Mazzei and company. Mazzei, a graduate of the U17 AAA Lancers, put in a night’s work on the PK alone.
“He’s a hard little worker,” agreed Romanchuk, another warrior on the PK. “He doesn’t have a lot of size, but you wouldn’t be able to tell. He works hard. He gets into the dirty zones.”
The Lancers’ captain also credited the rookie line of Scott, Brody Sunderland and Gavin Pratt for their work throughout the game.
“Our young-guns line was working, grinding all game long, bringing us some intensity,” he said. “We just tried to ride the intensity, and we battled back, but obviously couldn’t come out on top.”
‘A LOT OF GOOD WORK ON THE PK’
From his vantage point behind the bench, King recognized some of the same constants.
“Mazzei was phenomenal, winning faceoff draws, doing everything he can,” the coach said. “I thought we had a lot of guys do a lot of good work on the PK.
“Once again, it’s hard. We were doing well five-on-five. You have so much PK time that you lose your momentum. You’re just kind of in panic mode.
“But we’ll take a point. It’s not what we want, but it’s a step in the right direction, for sure, especially after last night where we came out pretty flat.”
That three-goal loss at Leduc saw Romanchuk score a goal and draw an assist on Sunderland’s first U18 goal, a power-play marker. Nickle opened all scoring five minutes into the Lancers’ season.
Leduc outshot Lloydminster 34-14 in a busy debut for Ammann. Owen Prasek tended goal for the Oil Kings. Brock MacDougall led the Leduc offence with a power-play goal and two assists. Jacob Fleming and Brett Stuparyk each posted a goal and an assist.
After a 2-2 first period, the Oil Kings went up 4-2 in the second. Kitscoty’s Sunderland closed the gap to 4-3 in the final period, before Leduc added two more goals, including a short-handed tally from Fleming.
“We dressed 17 skaters last night and, for 13 of them, I think it was their first U18 AAA game,” King said of his youthful Lancers. “That’s a tough go, because it was super physical.”
In both weekend games, Lloydminster was missing prized rookie forward Tripp Fischer, who has been sidelined with an ankle injury for almost four weeks.
Fischer, 15, doesn’t expect to be able to play this weekend when the Lancers visit the Terwilligar rinks in Edmonton for games against the Red Deer Optimist Chiefs on Saturday and the Calgary Northstars on Sunday. He hopes to possibly be ready for league play the following weekend, and then for the WHL Cup U16 prospects tournament in Red Deer. Fischer was among the 20 players named to Team Alberta last week.
Romanchuk leads the Lancers’ captaincy group, which includes Setzer, Logan Flewell, Ty Domshy and one more young player to be named, King said.
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