Aliaksei Protas scored two massive goals in Medicine Hat on Thursday. Lucas Chudleigh/Apollo Multimedia

By Jeff D'Andrea

Viper Bites

The Viper bites in the nick of time, scores twice late in OT win in Med Hat

Feb 5, 2020 | 11:11 PM

It didn’t look good.

The Prince Albert Raiders were trailing late to a team they hadn’t beaten all season, the Medicine Hat Tigers. They gave up a weird fluky goal from centre ice five minutes in. They had to kill four penalties against the league’s second best power play and had just one man advantage of their own. It looked for all money like the Raiders would end up 0-3-1 against the Tigers to end their season series and see their points streak halt at 11 games.

Aliaksei Protas had other ideas, and possibly the best 15 seconds of his WHL career.

The Viper of Vitebsk, Belarus scored with seven seconds remaining in regulation, then got the overtime winner eight seconds into the extra frame to give the Raiders a 4-3 win over the Tigers Wednesday in Medicine Hat. That extends the Raiders’ point streak to 12 games (8-0-1-3) and gives them wins in their last four contests.

Tigers captain James Hamblin had a chance to put the game to bed, but hit the post on the Raiders’ empty net. A few moments later, Raiders forward Spencer Moe flew up the ice with the extra attacker and set up Brayden Watts in front of the net. Watts’ shot was stopped, but Protas was unmarked in front of the empty net to tie it up. That was Protas’ 100^th WHL career point in 106 career games.

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Then to start the overtime period, Protas was on the ice, won the puck at the offensive blueline, and finished off a give-and-go between him and Watts to give the Raiders’ that elusive win over the Tigers.

Protas hadn’t scored in his previous six games, but did have five assists in that time. That was the longest stretch of games he’s played this year without scoring a goal. He now has 23 goals and 60 points in 45 games played with the Raiders.

“We kinda caught fire there, we didn’t have anything going in the third period,” Raiders assistant coach Jeff Truitt said. “We didn’t spend much time in the offensive zone. There were lots of stripped pucks by them and they carried the momentum into our zone… but we caught fire when we needed to.”

Protas wasn’t the only one achieving milestones on Wednesday, as Max Paddock picked up his 50^th win of his WHL career. Six of those have come in a Raider uniform, as he’s 6-0-0-2 with Prince Albert in eight appearances. Paddock, coming off WHL Goaltender of the Week and CHL Team of the Week honours, Paddock has been nothing short of stellar as a Raider. He has a .941 save percentage and 1.58 goals against average as a Raider. He made 30 saves on 33 shots against the Tigers.

Daniil Stepanov scored the Raiders’ first goal after sitting out the previous five games. The Raiders were playing some good hockey in that stretch and didn’t want to change too much—if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. But in doing that, Stepanov had to wait until Wednesday to finally get his chance, and scored just 6:20 into the game.

“It worked out, he got that goal for us. He’s hungry to play, there’s no doubt. And when the team is going well, you don’t really tamper with things too much with your lineup,” Truitt said. “That’s just what it was. But I give him a lot of credit. He practiced hard, he took a look at some video and had some meetings.”

Tigers shorthanded

The last time the two teams met on Jan. 25 at the Art Hauser Centre, Lukas Svejkovsky did this to top-pair defenceman Kaiden Guhle.

Svejkovsky was given a minor penalty on the play and did not receive any additional punishment for the league. But if you wondered if the Raiders got their revenge on Svejkovsky, they did not as Svejkovsky was out with illness for the game. The Tigers were also missing 16-year-old phenom Cole Sillinger, who leads all WHL rookies in scoring with 46 points in 42 games, and defenceman Elijah Brown.

Scoring Summary

First Period

1-0, Tigers, Baxter Anderson (unassisted), 5:00

1-1, Raiders, Daniil Stepanov from Eric Pearce and Zack Hayes, 6:20

Second Period

2-1, Tigers, Nick McCarry from Parker Gavlas and Bryan Lockner, 2:04

2-2, Raiders, Justin Nachbaur (unassisted), 6:09

Third Period

3-2, Tigers, Nick McCarry from Cole Clayton and Ryan Chyzowski, 15:32

3-3, Raiders, Aliaksei Protas from Brayden Watts and Spencer Moe, 19:53

Overtime

4-3, Raiders, Aliaksei Protas from Brayden Watts, 0:08

Wrapping up the roadie on the weekend

The Raiders will play their last two Alberta road games this regular season on the weekend. They’ll take on the Calgary Hitmen on Friday and the Lethbridge Hurricanes on Saturday. The Raiders will return home to the Art Hauser Centre on Valentine’s Day to face the Swift Current Broncos, and the Brandon Wheat Kings the following day.

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Jeff.dandrea@jpbg.ca

On Twitter: @jeff_paNOW