PREVIEW: Warriors open busy week in Alberta
The Moose Jaw Warriors have hit the road to Alberta for a pair of games to kick-off a busy week.
The Warriors will face off with the Edmonton Oil Kings in the first of four games in five nights.
“We just want to stay in the moment, Edmonton first and take care of business there,” Warriors head coach Mark O’Leary said of the busy stretch.
“If we just stay in the moment, look after each day, each game, one at a time, we’ll be okay.”
Moose Jaw is coming off one of its biggest wins of the season, beating the top-ranked Seattle Thunderbirds, 6-2, on Saturday night. With that win, the Warriors have now beaten the top team in each division this season, including the top two ranked teams in the Canadian Hockey League in an 11-day span.
The key for the team is now building off that victory.
“We just need to get more and more consistent every night,” Warriors captain Denton Mateychuk said. “That starts in practice and with our work habits, so we just got to keep working hard and we’ll get there.”
O’Leary said the Warriors need to carry the same mindset from game-to-game.
“It’s 100 percent in our control,” he said. “Our mindset going into games and how we prepare, how much we’re engaged in the moment… we’re going to learn from that and see if we can find some consistency of how we prepare and get ready for games.”
This week’s busy schedule will be a good test of the team’s preparation and consistency as they play four games over the next five days, including three of them on the road.
“We’ve just got to stay consistent, play our game, don’t let fatigue take over and try to do too much,” Mateychuk said. “We’ve got to compete, especially in those games later in the week, it’s hard and we’ve got to be ready for that.”
The Warriors and Oil Kings face-off on Tuesday night at 8 p.m. CST. Moose Jaw will travel to Red Deer to take on the Rebels on Wednesday.
After that, the Warriors return home for their only home game of the week on Friday when the Portland Winterhawks come to the Moose Jaw Events Centre.
The week ends on Saturday in Brandon against the Wheat Kings.
