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WHL Red Deer Rebels

Rebels Too Generous with Turnovers in Loss to Visiting Hitmen

September 29, 2019 - Western Hockey League (WHL)
Red Deer Rebels News Release


Making life easier than necessary for a quality opponent usually doesn't yield a positive result.

The Red Deer Rebels learned that the hard way in a 5-1 WHL loss to the Calgary Hitmen before 3,947 fans Saturday at the Centrium.

"Just the mistakes we made, the turnovers. It's a process with a lot of these kids and also the veterans," said Rebels GM/head coach Brent Sutter.

"We just turned too many pucks over. We had pucks on our sticks and would try to make a difficult play instead of making an easy play. And we didn't have the support in some areas we need to have.

"When you play that way you get chasing the game a lot, and when you have turnovers like that, especially in the neutral zone, they end up being scoring chances against you and for sure shots on goal against you."

While the Rebels indeed chased the play at times, they trailed just 2-1 after 40 minutes. But the visitors cashed in three times in the final period to win going away.

With Red Deer defenceman Ethan Sakowich off for holding, Hitmen rearguard Egor Zamula opened the scoring 4:29 into the contest when he beat Byron Fancy with a point shot the Rebels netminder never saw.

Dawson Barteaux evened the count just over three minutes later with a nearly identical goal with the Rebels working a five-on-three power play.

But Calgary forward Riley Stotts potted the first of his three goals on the evening with a power-play tally - at the 11-minute mark - on a wrist shot from the left circle.

Neither team could find the back of the net in the second period but the Hitmen extended their lead a mere nine seconds into the final frame. Again, Stotts pulled the trigger when he cut through the top of the crease and redirected a shot from along the left wall by Luke Prokop.

"It's a sin to give up a goal in the first few minutes or the last few minutes of a period and they scored nine seconds into the third on just a routine play that should never happen," said Sutter.

Stotts completed his hat trick on a short-handed wrap around near the midway point of the period and Layne Toder buried a point shot to round out the scoring.

The Hitmen were two-for-three with a man advantage. The Rebels' power play struggled, going one-for-seven.

"They got two power play goals in the first period and we had some power play time and didn't generate anything on it," said Sutter.

"Again, it's a young team and we have to continue to work with them. I don't want to keep using that phrase but the reality is we have a lot of work to do with this group.

"There's going to be a lot of patience involved but they have to learn from their mistakes too. You can't continue to make the same mistakes over and over again. That doesn't allow your team to get better."

Fancy, making his first start of the season, made 28 saves. The Rebels directed 16 shots at Hitmen goalie Jack McNaughton, including just two in the third period.

"We just have to stay with it," said Sutter. "We need our veterans to be better too. The veterans and making some mistakes they can't make.

"It's a group thing and we have to stay with it."

Notable: Western Hockey League commissioner Rob Robson presented Sutter with a plaque prior to the game in honour of the Rebels bench boss posting his 500th career win late last season . . . The Rebels reduced their roster to 23 players by reassigning defenceman Ryan Gottfried to the Neepawa Natives of the MJHL earlier in the week.

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The opinions expressed in this release are those of the organization issuing it, and do not necessarily reflect the thoughts or opinions of OurSports Central or its staff.

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