Feb 27 at Medicine Hat
IT’S TIME…RAIDER REVIEW: The Prince Albert Raiders will be playing their 66th contest of the season tonight as they take on the Medicine Hat Tigers in the middle of a three game road swing…The Raiders are coming off a huge 5-3 win in Kootenay on Wednesday night as they sit tied for that 8th and final playoff spot with the Edmonton Oil Kings with 61 points…James Dobrowolski scored his first WHL hat-trick in the win while Brandon Herrod and Ryan Harrison had 3 point nights…The Raiders opened the scoring at 6:40 of the first while on the PP and then went up 2-0 after Herrod would score his 14th of the season on a shorthanded breakaway…Kootenay would cut the lead in half before heading into the middle frame…Dobrowolski scored the lone goal in the second and then put the Raiders up 4-1 early in the third while on the PP…Ryan Kowalski would score his 1st goal of the season and 2nd of his career to put the game away with a 5-1 lead…The Ice would score two late goals on the PP to pad their stats but were on the losing end of the 5-3 decision…Ryan Button and Jordan Rowley each chipped in with one assist…Garrett Zemlak was solid in his first action in five games as he stopped 39 of 42 shots to earn his 14th win of the season…The Raiders win tied a season high 3 game winning streak on the road as the team improved to 28-32-4-1 on the season which puts them 5 points up on the Regina Pats.
SPECIAL TEAMS: The Raiders powerplay has been a bright spot this season as they went 2 for 4 Wednesday night…The Raiders are 65/286 (22.7%) with six shorthanded markers against which ranks them 6th in the league…The penalty kill has struggled as of late and was 4 for 7 against Kootenay…They are 242/310 (78.1%) with four shorthanded goals which ranks them 16th in the WHL while down a man.
UPCOMING GAMES: This is the second contest of a three game road swing as the Raiders will play in Red Deer tomorrow night before returning home to host the Brandon Wheat Kings on Wednesday night.
VS. THE TIGERS: This is the fourth and final meeting between the Raiders and Tigers this season with the Raiders holding a 2-1 record…The two teams met on October 4th in Prince Albert where the Raiders beat the Tigers 5-4 in overtime…The Raiders were up 3-0 after one and blew a three goal lead in the third only to have rookie Ryan Harrison win it in overtime…Zemlak made 37 saves on 41 shots for the victory…The Raiders then traveled to Medicine Hat on November 18th and were dealt a 2-1 loss with the Tigers scoring the game winner late in the third…Cole Penner, who was called up to play, scored the Raiders lone goal in the contest as Steven Stanford put aside 31 of 33 shots…In the last meeting on February 11th in Prince Albert, the Raiders erased a 3 goal, third period deficit to win 6-5 in overtime with former Tiger, Jordan Hickmott scoring the game winner…Justin Bernhardt had a four point night while Stanford earned the victory…Dating back five years, the Raiders are 8-9-3-2 against the Tigers and are 3-5-1-2 in Medicine Hat…Leading the Raiders against Medicine Hat this season is Herrod with 1 goal and 4 assists…Bernhardt and Cameron have each chipped in with 4 points…The Tigers are coming off a 6-1 loss against Kelowna as they are 5-4-1-0 in their past ten…The Tigers are an impressive 20-8-1-1 on home ice.
INJURY REPORT: Patrick Kozyra – Shoulder (day to day), Jordan Kochan – Facial Laceration (day to day), Dustin Cameron – Ankle (week to week)
RAIDER REPORT: The Raiders have called up 17 year-old left winger Cole Penner for this weekend as the injury bug has hit the Raiders lineup with their captain, Dustin Cameron being the latest victim…Guys have been stepping up though as Dobrowolski ended his 11 game pointless streak with his first WHL hat-trick on Wednesday while Kowalski ended his 14 game pointless streak with his first goal of the season…Herrod has been on fire in February as he has 5 goals and 7 assists in 9 games…Harrison has 6 points in his last five games since returning from injury…Stanford and Zemlak have been solid over the last 4 games, giving up 3 goals per game and giving the team a chance to win…On the cold side, Bernhardt is now scoreless in his last six games while Igor Revenko has been held pointless in 7 of his 9 games in February…Garrett Thiessen is pointless in 32 games and Ryan Aasman is pointless in 24 games…Bernhardt continues to lead the Raiders with 82 points this season, dropping him into 5th in league scoring…He is on pace for the highest points total in the past 12 seasons as Seth Leonard had 90 in 2003-04…He is also on pace to be the 2nd Raider in the top ten of league scoring since Jeff Neilson was 6th with 113 points in 1991-92…Cameron(33), McDonald(32) and Bernhardt(31) are all in the top 20 in goals scored, the first time since 1998-99 the Raiders have had 3 players with over 30 goals in a season…McDonald will be playing in his 300th game tonight as his 4 game point streak was snapped in Kootenay…The Raiders have outscored their opponents 66-59 in the 1st period and 73-69 in the 2nd period but have been outscored 108-60 in the final frame…Prince Albert is 21-4-2-1 when leading after two periods and are 22-8-2-1 when scoring first…The green and gold are 21-5-2-0 when scoring 4 goals or more and 5-20-3-1 when allowing 4 goals or more…The Raiders are 9-10-2-1 against Central Division teams this season.
