Even though the outcome of the game was determined by less than a minute of play, with Medicine Chest (10-4-2) scoring two goals 29 seconds apart, Edgewater Hotel (8-5-3) players feel they were flat from start to finish in their 2-0 loss Wednesday at Takhini Arena.
“I think we were pretty much sleeping throughout the whole game,” said Edgewater’s Martin O’Hagan. “We weren’t making too many plays, we couldn’t get out of our end.”
Assisted by Greg Bull, Medicine’s Dennis Connelly scored both goals on one shift.
Medicine’s Ryan Hennings ripped a shot from the point that was deflected behind the net by Bull and went off the boards and out in front on the other side where Connelly rammed it in short side. Then Bull chipped the puck into the Edgewater half where Connelly picked it up, manoeuvred around the defence and scored in short range.
Having taken the league’s first-place spot last week, the win anchors Medicine at the top of the standings over the AON Flames (7-5-3).
“Glen (Traverse) had a really strong game in goal,” said Connelly, of his team’s netminder. “In the first period he made some real key saves when it was still 0-0.”
Although a Medicine Chest player showed up midway through the first period, the team still played the game with a depleted roster of just nine players.
“We just said, ‘Look, they’re a good team, we’re not going to outskate them, make the puck do the work, look for the open guy and pass it,’ and we slowed the game down,” said Connelly. “And we slowed them down.
“For most of the game we held on to the puck and made the puck do the work.”
Edgewater has the dubious distinction of being the league leaders in penalty minutes with more than 100 recorded.
“He had 20 minutes in one game,” said O’Hagan, about teammate Shelby Workman. “It’s a streak — pretty much every game (he gets penalized).”
Both teams are coming off big wins from Sunday — big in different meanings. Medicine Chest had a big win in terms of goals, blowing out the last place Klondyke Dental Molars 9-1.
“We just got a lot of shots and … I think he just got tired,” said Connelly, of Molars goalie Ray Davies. “Cause we put a lot of pucks at the net.”
In the following game Edgewater came out big against the Flames, winning 5-3. The Flames have had the league’s top spot in a strangle hold for most of the season, but slipped to second with a series of recent losses.
“I don’t think we were playing up to what we were doing the last two games,” added O’Hagan.