Strong effort not enough as Rebels fall to Tigers
Tigers 4 Rebels 2
The Red Deer Rebels more than doubled the Medicine Hat Tigers in shots in Wednesday’s WHL contest at the Peavey Mart Centrium.
Unfortunately for the Rebels, the Tigers doubled their hosts where it mattered — on the scoreboard.
The visitors got a 32-save performance from first star Zach Zahara and took full advantage of their best scoring chances for a 4-2 victory before an impressive holiday audience of 6,023.
Red Deer squandered a strong performance in terms of work ethic and a highlight reel goal from rookie forward Jeramiah Roberts.
“I thought we came out a bit passive but in the second and third, with our forecheck, we were excellent,” said Rebels head coach Derrick Walser.
“I thought we deserved a better fate tonight, but it’s a learning curve… We have to learn from it.”
The Tigers snapped a 1-1 tie with a power play goal 3:22 into the third period, just three seconds after Matthew Gard was assessed a roughing penalty.
The goal came directly off a faceoff to the right of netminder Rhett Stoesser, with Andrew Basha feeding Shane Smith with a nifty backhand pass.
“We can’t give free looks like that,” said Walser. “It was an unnecessary penalty to take at a bad time and they capitalized.”
Roberts got the goal back 11 minutes later, taking a feed from Ollie Josephson, taking two strides to the net and scoring a sensational between-the-legs marker, his first in the WHL.
This HAS to be in contention for the best, first-career @TheWHL goal ever!!! pic.twitter.com/M5afjQ0Cos
— Red Deer Rebels (@Rebelshockey) December 28, 2023
“He’s missed a lot of time (due to injury) and he’s getting back and playing hard,” said Walser. “We all know he has talent, he’s a good player. It was nice to see him get his first goal of the year.”
Rebels captain Kai Uchacz was similarly impressed with the tally.
“A really nice goal,” said Uchacz. “He was out for a good chunk of the first half of the season. He’s been working hard in practice. He likes working on those creative plays and it showed in the game. It was good to see that.”
The Tigers, however, responded shortly after on a redirect by Oasiz Weisblatt and then sealed the deal — after some Red Deer pressure — with an empty net goal by Hayden Harsanyi.
Medicine Hat defenceman Dru Krebs opened the scoring 12:28 into the game, beating Stoesser with a high shot from 20 feet out.
Mats Lindgren pulled the Rebels even with a power play goal late in the second period, hauling in a pass from defensive partner Hunter Mayo and firing a slapshot that Zahara never saw.
The Rebels held the Tigers, one of the league’s top scoring teams, to a mere 11 shots over the first two periods and just 19 overall.
But it was all for naught.
The Tigers finished one-for-two on with a man advantage while the Rebels were one-for-six.
The Rebels were able to kill a late second period penalty that ran into the third period, but couldn’t erase the Tigers’ second power play.
“I didn’t like the first one and then we gave them a free one,” said Walser. “You can’t give teams with that kind of firepower those looks and they came back to bite us.”
“We had a really good first and second period, we held them in the D zone,” said Uchacz. “But then we gave them a power play in the third and they capitalized three seconds in, right off the faceoff.
“For us it’s a learning curve. We can’t take that penalty in the third with a team like that, with the offensive firepower they have.”
The Rebels, who had a multitude of near misses and also ran into a hot goalie, will attempt to get back on the winning track when they hit the road for games Friday and Saturday in Lethbridge and Swift Current.
“It’s not the start we wanted to have going into the second half of the season with the outcome of that game,” said Uchacz. “But I thought we put in a pretty good effort for our first game back (from the Christmas break).
“They got a couple of bounces and they have a good group over there and capitalized on their chances.”
Notable: Stoesser finished with 15 saves, including a penalty shot stop on Basha, and couldn’t be faulted on a single Medicine Hat goal . . . Josephson assisted on both Red Deer markers and was selected as the game’s second star. Roberts was named third star . . . The Rebels will pay a return visit to Medicine Hat next Tuesday and will be back at the Centrium three days later, again against the Tigers.
(Photos by Taylor Lachance)
