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Scott injured in Raiders’ home opener loss to MJ

Sep 22, 2017 | 9:56 PM

The Prince Albert Raiders will have to wait until Saturday’s rematch against the Moose Jaw Warriors to not only get their first win of the season, but their first goal as well.

The Raiders were shutout by the Warriors 3-0 Friday at the Art Hauser Centre in the Raiders’ home opener.

Raiders goaltender Ian Scott did everything he could to keep the Raiders in the game. He made 26 saves on 28 shots 41 minutes into the game before leaving to injury and was replaced by backup Nicholas Sanders.

“He moved quickly and it’s a lower body injury,” Raiders head coach Marc Habscheid said. “Those aren’t good on goaltenders. It’s the way it is and we’ll see how it goes.

“It’s next man up. We have two other goaltenders in camp, they’ll have to run with it for a little bit here. It gives them an opportunity. It’s just unfortunate because I thought Scottie played well tonight.”

It was Curtis Miske’s first game as the Raiders’ captain. He much would have rather talked about a win, instead of his injured goalie after his first contest with the captain’s ‘C.’

“It’s obviously a big blow to us,” Miske said. “He’s a very good goalie and we rely on him back there lots of times. To see him go down like that is not a good thing, but we’re just hoping he’s alright.”

The Warriors needed less than three minutes to score on the cold Sanders, as Jett Woo extended the lead to 3-0 with a screened shot from the point.

Brayden Burke opened the scoring in the second period, scoring on a 3-on-2 rush. Justin Almeida gave the Warriors a 2-0 lead after his shot was going wide, but it took a deflection off the skate of Raiders defenceman Brayden Pachal.

Although the Raiders were outshot 40-21 and outscored 3-0, but the coaching staff in Habscheid and associate coach Dave Manson believed the team did play well.

“I told the guys after, they know Manse and I well enough. If we think they played a bad game, we’ll tell them. I didn’t think we played bad at all, I thought we played a pretty good game,” Habscheid said. “We just had a tough time scoring, they generated a few more chances, but there were way more positives than negatives. I liked our energy, I liked our execution in a lot of things.”

Scoring Summary

First Period

No scoring.

Second Period

1-0, Moose Jaw, Brayden Burke from Noah Gregor and Tanner Jeannot, 6:36

Third Period

2-0, Moose Jaw, Justin Almeida (unassisted), 0:56

3-0, Moose Jaw, Jett Woo from Brenden Kwiatkowski and Tate Popple, 3:52

Goaltenders

Prince Albert: Ian Scott, 41:12, 26-28, Nicholas Sanders, 18:48, 11-12

Moose Jaw: Brody Willms, 60:00, 21-21

Special Teams

Prince Albert: 0-2 power play; 3-3 penalty kill

Moose Jaw: 0-3 power play; 2-2 penalty kill

Three Stars

1. Brayden Burke

2. Jett Woo

3. Brody Willms

Attendance: 2,514

Parks and recreation

Parker Kelly is the only Raiders player yet to return from NHL training camps. Coming into the season as a development camp invite with the Ottawa Senators, Kelly signed an entry level contract with the Sens on Tuesday.

Goaltender Ian Scott (Toronto Maple Leafs), D-man Vojtech Budik (Buffalo Sabres) and Jordy Stallard (Winnipeg Jets) all returned to the Raiders.

Also sitting out for the Raiders were rookie forward Justin Nachbaur, who sat out his second of a four-game suspension. Austin Crossley is dealing with an upper body injury and will be out for both games this weekend.

Two Warriors missing in action

The Warriors have lost two players to NHL camps for the time being. The Warriors’ top defenceman Josh Brook, older brother of Raiders prospect Jakob Brook, injured his wrist Montreal Canadiens camp and will likely not return to the Tribe’s lineup until Christmas. He underwent surgery to repair the wrist on Friday.

Brett Howden, who’s been the Warriors’ captain for the past two seasons, is still with the Tampa Bay Lightning this preseason. Especially considering he was the Lightning’s first round pick in 2016, his status with the Warriors is in limbo.

Finishing up the home-and-homer

Both teams will meet on Saturday at Mosaic Place in Moose Jaw to complete the home-and-home series.

 

Jeff.dandrea@jpbg.ca

On Twitter: @jeff_paNOW