BONNYVILLE - After a wild 7-6 shootout win over the Devon Barons on Oct. 14, the Bonnyville Senior ‘AA’ Pontiacs came home to the Bonnyville C2 Centre for their home opener against the visiting Red Deer Rustlers on Saturday night.
The Rustlers, who had earned a win over the Wetaskiwin Longhorns earlier in the week, came in red hot and defeated the Pontiacs with a resounding 8-3 decision.
Things went wrong pretty quickly for the Pontiacs when Red Deer’s Chris Rauckman scored less than five minutes in. His tally was followed up just over four minutes later by teammate Parker Johnstone, and again a minute later by Tyler Berkholtz. Bonnyville did manage to get a goal before the period ended, as Denis Cadrin potted one, assisted by captain Lucas Isley, to cut the lead to 3-1.
Red Deer continued their success into the second period, as Matthew Belich scored to make it 4-1. Bonnyville cut the lead to two again courtesy of Janson Pashniak. The rest of the period flip-flopped between the two teams, as Red Deer’s Cale Walker scored, followed by a Bonnyville power play goal by Ryan Piche, and to cap the period off, a Mike Dempster tally for the Rustlers to extend his team’s lead, 6-3.
Rauckman struck again in the third to make it 7-3 Red Deer, and the only other goal in the third was by his teammate Donovan Lumb on the power play to complete the 8-3 victory. The shots on goal were 38-37 for Red Deer. Rustlers goaltender Nathan Alalouf stopped 34 of 37 for a .918 save percentage, while Bonnyville’s Jordan Duffy stopped 30 of 38 for a .789 save percentage.
Bonnyville head coach Corey Wandler thought the game was closer than the score may have indicated, but acknowledged his team’s lacklustre performance.
“I think we obviously just came out flat and didn’t have the start we wanted. We spotted three goals, and when you play a team like Red Deer, it's tough to climb out of a hole like that when you’re down 3-0 in the first 10 minutes. We kind of found our legs after that, we got a goal to make it three one, and to me, we were the better team in the last ten minutes of the first. We pressed hard and had good chances, but we just couldn’t convert."
Speaking about the second period, the coach said, "I thought we played pretty strong as well, there was a couple of times where we had the grip on the game, we were winning consecutive shifts and doing the things we needed to do, but we just couldn’t convert when we needed one. When we do get one to make the score a bit closer, we just start to get back on our heels a bit, and we give up one. I thought we just gave up too many easy goals for them, that part I didn’t like. Anytime we got momentum back, we gave one up and just derailed us."
And despite keeping the game in the Rustlers' zone throughout the third period, the Pontiacs "just couldn’t find one, couldn't get a loose puck to get a rebound, couldn’t find one when they needed one, and they just wore us down," said Wandler. "We got into some penalty trouble and they squeaked one in the third, and by that our guys just figured it was done and we couldn’t fight back."
The Rustlers and Pontiacs are part of the North Central Hockey League (NCHL).
