MOOSE JAW -- The Moose Jaw WINMAR Warriors continue to find the win column in Sask Male AAA Hockey League action, and now find themselves beginning to pull away from the rest of the pack.
The Warriors rolled to a 10-3 victory over the Yorkton Maulers in Yorkton on Saturday night, remaining unbeaten in regulation and improving to 9-0-1-0 on the campaign. That’s good enough for a five-point lead over the Regina Pat Canadians and Warman Wildcats in second place in the 12-team league.
Things were actually close right up until the midpoint of the game, thanks to a pair of power play goals from each team.
Max Fuessel scored the only goal of the first period to give Moose Jaw a 1-0 lead before Carson Park extended their edge with 1:24 gone in the second. Yorkton rallied with a pair of goals just over a minute apart midway through the period, with Broden Wotherspoon and Meric Poncelet scoring to make it a 2-2 game at the 9:15 mark.
The Warriors went on a roll from there, though, beginning with a Carson Deitrich goal at the 10:04 mark, followed by Tobin Schafer making it 4-2 with 7:14 to play in the period and Deichert extending the edge to three goals at the with 4:08 remaining
Goals from Park and Ryan Gibbs 55 seconds apart early in the third made the result all but academic, and after Yorkton’s Hogan Hickman scored at the 11:32 mark, Moose Jaw would pull away once and for all.
Fuessell and Gibbs each scored their second of the game before Ryder Gilroy finished things off with 51 seconds remaining.
Moose Jaw ended up with five power play goals on the night.
Steven Wawryk stopped 18 shots to earn the win, Ben Wagner faced 50 shots in the Yorkton goal.
Park and Fuessel each finished with four points on the night, while Deichert, Gibbs and Tobin Schaefer had three points apiece. Marek McIvor added two assists.
Other action on Saturday saw Regina get goals from Malaki Martin, Maddox Schultz and Grady Hodgins in the first period and go on to a 4-1 win over the Battlefords Stars while Warman had goals from Koston Baliski and Declan Borthwick to take a 2-0 win over the Saskatoon Contacts.
Swift Current defeated Notre Dame 6-2, Tisdale got past Prince Albert 6-2 and Estevan downed the Saskatoon Blazers 4-2 to cap Saturday action.
Sunday games saw the Pat Canadians improve to 7-1-0-0 thanks to a pair of goals and a four-point game from Liam Pue in a 4-1 win over Battlefords. One other result saw Prince Albert take a 2-0 victory over the Tisdale Trojans.
League action continues Wednesday with Yorkton at Notre Dame. Puck drop is 7:30 p.m.
