Wheat Kings need win

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 16/05/2010 (5599 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

BRANDON — It was the morning after the disastrous opening night before and a night’s sleep had served to bring some things into focus for Brandon Wheat Kings head coach Kelly McCrimmon.

First, his team is better than they showed in a 9-3 throttling by the OHL champion Windsor Spitfires in the opening game of the 2010 MasterCard Memorial Cup at WestMan Place Friday night.

And second? His team better start playing like it — and quickly. Brandon’s next game comes this afternoon against a Moncton Wildcats club that will be angry and on edge after blowing a 3-0 lead Saturday afternoon and losing 5-4 to the WHL champion Calgary Hitmen in the first game of the tournament for those two teams.

“We were far from our best (Friday) night,” McCrimmon said Saturday following a morning practice with his Brandon club. “And with the field we have here, you have to be ready to play and you have to play real well to have a chance at success.”

Ditto, said Wheaties forward — and Dallas Stars first-rounder — Scott Glennie. “We all have to get better. We all have to play a lot better than we played last night,” said Glennie. “Quite honestly, our team is a lot better than that. That was just a bad game for us and come Sunday, we’re going to be a completely different team and have a completely different mindset.”

The consensus around the hometown entry is that a 20-day layoff prior to Friday’s opener didn’t help their chances. And the shaky start they got from backup goaltender Andrew Hayes — who McCrimmon started Friday based on recent practices and what the coach called “a gut feel” — was not nearly good enough against a Windsor team that pumped four pucks into the Brandon net in the game’s first five minutes.

The good news is there’s nothing to focus the mind like a 9-3 embarrassment in front of the hometown faithful. And it would seem safe to predict that the only ‘feel’ McCrimmon will be playing from here on is the safe one that elects to start proven goalie Jacob De Serres, who’s started 12 of Brandon’s 15 games this post-season.

“It’s a new day,” said Wheat Kings defenceman Colby Robak. “Nobody wants to get beat like that, especially when you’re hosting the Memorial Cup. But fortunately, we had a good practice (Saturday) and we’re ready for (today).”

While the mood was serious around the Brandon team, there was one lighter moment with reporters Saturday when McCrimmon was asked by one scribe about his club’s aggressive physical play in the first few moments of Friday night’s game — before the four-goal Windsor onslaught put the game away.

“There’s an optimist,” McCrimmon laughed. “I thought we did have a good first two minutes, to be honest. I wouldn’t say that if you hadn’t asked. But I thought we had good intentions and I thought we played hard. But we got in trouble right away.”

McCrimmon’s club will need more than two minutes of solid play and good intentions today to beat the QMJHL champion from New Brunswick. Moncton looked much the better team for the first two periods against the Calgary Hitmen, dominating the play from the game’s outset and outshooting the Hitmen 13-3 in the first period and 28-14 through the first two periods.

Indeed, were it not for the stellar play of Calgary netminder Martin Jones — the top goalie in the WHL this season — the second game of this Memorial Cup would also have been a blowout early. Instead, the Hitmen kept Moncton within reach, tied the game with less than four minutes to go in the third period and then got the winner at 18:29 when a clearing attempt took a strange bounce off the Zamboni door and out front of the Moncton net, where Calgary’s Tyler Shattock banged it past Wildcats netminder Nicola Riopel for the winner.

“It’s a short tournament so we have to forget about this one quickly,” said Wildcats forward Alex Saulnier.

Which is, of course, exactly what Brandon was saying earlier in the day.

paul.wiecek@freepress.mb.ca