Hurricanes End 2025 with 7-1 Loss to Oil Kings on Tuesday
Lethbridge, AB – The Lethbridge Hurricanes ended 2025 with a 7-1 loss to the Edmonton Oil Kings at the VisitLethbridge.com Arena.
Lethbridge entered with a 6-5-0-1 record in their last 12 games at home including an overtime victory against Edmonton on December 16th. The Hurricanes had a great first period as they came out buzzing and appeared to open the scoring when Kayden Longley redirected a point shot past Ethan Simcoe to make it 1-0, but after a video review, the goal was disallowed to keep it scoreless. The ‘Canes continued to press and once again came close to opening the scoring when Lukas Lima had a great net drive to cut to the goal before tapping a shot just wide of the net. Edmonton found the net first late in the frame when Lukas Sawchyn tapped home his 16th goal of the year to make it 1-0 with just 2:53 remaining in the opening period. The Hurricanes outshot the Oil Kings 10-8 in the first period but trailed 1-0 after twenty minutes of play.
Edmonton took over the game in the second period as they outshot Lethbridge 16-4 in the middle frame. The Oil Kings added to their lead when Josh Lee potted his third of the season at the 10:56 mark finishing a pass from Sawchyn to make it 2-0. Just under three-minutes later, the Oil Kings struck again while four-on-four when Gavin Hodnett made a beautiful play from behind the net to find Parker Alcos who buried his second goal in three games to make it 3-0. Koen Cleaver made a pair of great saves on the doorstep robbing Kanjyu Gojsic point blank. However, before the period was out, Edmonton made it 4-0 when Kayden Stroeder poked home a loose puck that slipped by Koen Cleaver on a goal mouth scramble as the Oil Kings led by four goals after forty minutes of play.
In the third period, the Oil Kings continued to add to their lead making it a 5-0 game just 2:12 into the frame when Stroeder scored his second of the night beating Cleaver over the glove from the left circle; Gojsic and No Ta’Amu earned the assists on the goal. Lethbridge’s lone goal came just 22-seconds after the Stroeder tally when Carsen Adair leaned into a slapshot beating a screened Simcoe to cut the deficit back to four-goals with his third goal of the year; Hudson Kibblewhite – who returned the lineup after missing two games with illness – and Luke Cozens were credited with the assists on the goal. Edmonton added to more goals before the conclusion of the game as Andrew O’Neill scored his 14th goal of the season on a power play at 8:51 before Miroslav Holinka buried his team-leading 21st of the year with 9:26 to play to round out the scoring making it a 7-1 game. The Oil Kings held the edge in shots 13-5 in the third period.
The Hurricanes were outshot 37-19 in the game by the Oil Kings. Lethbridge went 0/2 on the power play while Edmonton was 1/3 with the extra man.
Three stars of the game were:
1) Oil Kings – #95 Lukas Sawchyn (1 goal, 2 assists)
2) Oil Kings – #6 Parker Alcos (1 goal, 1 assist)
3) Oil Kings – #17 Gavin Hodnett (2 assists)
The loss for the Hurricanes was their third-straight defeat as they drop their second-straight against the Oil Kings. Lethbridge’s record slipped to 11-25-0-1 on the year as their home record fell to 6-11-0-1 on the season and 6-6-0-1 in their last 13 at the VisitLethbridge.com Arena. With the loss, the Hurricanes finish the calendar year of 2025 with a record of 35-33-2-1 in 71 regular season games.
The Hurricanes will open the 2026 portion of their schedule on Friday, January 2nd at 7:00pm when they welcome the Broncos in the first of a home-and-home set before visiting Swift Current on Saturday. Tickets for the game can be purchased by visiting the VisitLethbridge.com Arena Ticket Centre, by calling 403-329-SEAT (7328) or online at www.visitlethbridgearena.ca.
