The La Ronge Ice Wolves have drawn first blood in the Bauer Conference Final. Dan Conacher redirected a point-shot home 15 seconds into overtime to give the Wolves the 5-4 victory.
Over 1800 fans were in attendance for Game One of the series, and they were treated to a rather entertaining game.
The Ice Wolves jumped out to a 2-0 by the 12:00 minute of the first period. Brody Malek got booted for checking from behind just over five minutes in, and the Ice Wolves made them pay.
The Stars failed to clear the puck out of their own zone on a penalty-kill and Doug Lindensmith made them pay by scoring his fourth of the playoffs. Taylor Pillar scored off another turnover at 11:55 and the North Star fans were silenced early by the Ice Wolves.
The Stars inched back within one 1:14 seconds later when Mitch Wall (4) put home a rebound off a Brett Miller shot. Woody Klassen (1) tied the game at 15:34 after a nifty setup from Blake Peake behind the La Ronge net.
The Ice Wolves outshot the Battlefords 15-12 in period one.
Star's captain Mitch Wall missed the second period after he was high-sticked in the face. The high-stick went un-detected. However Tony Oak got dinged with a double-minor for high sticking moments later, and again Doug Lindemsith went to work.
Dustin Stevenson fed the puck to Marc-Andre Carre at the half-wall. Carre quickly sent the puck to Lindensmith in the slot, and somehow he had all day in front to grab his second of the night.
Late in the second, the Stars would tie it thanks to the give-and-go combination of Blake Tatchell and Boyd Wakelin. After the passing play, Tatchell skated in one-on-one with Dustin Stevenson, and made a great move to get by him. One stride later, the puck was behind Adam Bartko and Tatchell had his third of the playoffs.
Early in the third period, Doug Lindensmith completed his hat-trick. Lindensmith won the faceoff cleanly in the offensive zone and then blew by his defender and went straight to the front of the net. Todd Fiddler put a back-hand on net, and the rebound came right to Lindensmith who was un-touched en-route to his third goal of the game.
The Wolves kept their 4-3 lead until the late stages of the third period, when Liam Brennan took a holding penalty which gave the Stars their fourth power-play of the game. An off-balance Mitch Wall managed to slip a pass across the crease to Brett Miller (4) who one-timed it in to force a 4-4 score.
THe Stars had a glorious chance to score in the final five minutes, but Shay Neufeld was unable to convert on a two-on-one pass from Blake Peake. The Ice Wolve's Lindensmith had another chance late in the game, but Graham Hildebrand did his part to keep the game tied.
Right off the overtime faceoff, Dustin Stevenson had the puck had his own blueline and passed the puck up the left-wing side. The puck appeared to miss the stick of the Ice Wolve winger, and went the length of the ice. Hildebrand had his arm up signalling icing, but the linesman let the play continue. Taylor Pillar battled the puck free from Cody Folstad in the corner of the Star's zone, and sent the pack back to the blueline. The point-shot found it's way through, and deflected off Dan Conacher and in.
Game Over.
The Ice Wolves now have a 1-0 lead, and have temporarily stolen home-ice advantage in this series. Game Two goes tonight at 7:30 from the North Battleford Civic Center.
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A bad non-call? Certainly! Can anything really be gained from dissecting the play to death? No.
Either way you slice it, the Stars are down 1-0, and must now put this game to rest and move forward. The importance of Game Two tonight has now been magnified by quite a bit. Nobody in North Star Nation wants to head to La Ronge down 2-0 in the series.
The Stars were in this exact situation last round against the Mustangs and it worked out just fine. One game does not define a series, and I know deep down that we've got a ton of hockey left this season.
Be loud tonight North Star Nation.
My Game Two Preview will be posted in the afternoon.
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