Stars Take Another Two Points in a shootout.

Fans at the Civic Center have certainly been getting their moneys worth as of late.

Saturday night, the Battlefords North Stars won their seventh straight game on home ice with a 5-4 shootout victory over the league-leading Weyburn Red Wings.

The North Stars found themselves in trouble early. They took some penalties, and allowed the Red Wings to establish a lot of offensive possession. At one point, the Wings were outshooting the Stars 9-1.

But late in the first period, the Mitch Wall (5) capitalized on the power-play and gave his team a 1-0 lead. Nathan Tomac (1) would score a minute and eighteen seconds later to make it a 2-0 game.

The Red Wings would inch within one at 7:56 of the second period when Chris Daniels tallied on the power-play.

But the Stars would regain their two-goal lead late in the frame. Ward Szucki (2) was finally rewarded for his great play of late, when he banged home a loose puck in front of AJ Whiffen at 19:26 of the second period.

Early in the third, the Stars made it 4-1 when Brody Malek (3) scored an unassisted power-play marker at 1:56 of the third period.

But once again the Stars had immense difficulty holding onto a lead. The Wings crept a little closer when Tyler Penny scored at 7:04 of the third. Forrest Dell bridged the gap to one when he scored at 15:44, and then with the goaltender pulled in the final minute, Weyburn tied the score when Rhett Bly finished off a neat pass from Andrew Perrault.

Overtime solved nothing (again).

For the past home games, the Stars were heading to a shootout, and why change a thing?

Blake Peake shot first, and made no mistake.

Rhett Bly shot first for Weyburn, and out-waited Kyle Birch to tie the score at one.

Justin Waskewitch and Jesse Lebreton both missed for the Stars.

Andrew Perrault and Brock Appleyard did the same for Weyburn.

When Brett Miller took the ice for the Stars, the 700 strong at the Civic Center got loud. It must have helped, because for the third straight game at home, Brett Miller buried in the shootout.

Tyler Penny was stoned by Birch on the final shot, and the Stars remain unbeaten on home ice.
The North Stars though may have lost the services of Graham Hilldebrand for awhile.

Hilldebrand was originally supposed to get the start in goal for the Stars, but was injured in warm-up. The initial prognosis wasn’t too good, but we should know more within the upcoming days.


Up next for the Stars: A home matchup with the Humboldt Broncos on Wednesday, Oct 28th. Make sure you go out and vote, then head to the Civic Center for another great matchup between these two teams.