Prince Albert Raiders assistant coach Ryan McDonald runs the bench for Team Sask at the Canada Winter Games. (Flickr/Team Sask)

By Rob Mahon

McDonald Leads Team Sask

Raiders assistant coach leads Team Sask men’s hockey to perfect round robin at Winter Games

Feb 22, 2023 | 4:00 PM

The last time Saskatchewan won a medal in men’s hockey at the Canada Winter Games was a gold medal in 1995 in Grande Prairie. This iteration of the team, competing in Prince Edward Island, is well on its way to joining them in the ranks of medalists.

Led by Prince Albert Raiders assistant coach Ryan McDonald, Team Sask is off to a 3-0 start at the event and has secured first place in their group. They now wait to see who their opponent will be for Thursday afternoon’s quarter final.

“A lot of credit to our guys, they’ve worked hard every single game,” McDonald said. “We’ve built every single game and they continue to get better and better. We had a fantastic game against Quebec yesterday. They managed the puck well, and in our mind we set out to win the puck position game and we did.”

Perhaps it’s no surprise Saskatchewan is doing so well, given how much highly touted talent is available to them. Raiders first round pick Luke Moroz is one of six players on the team selected in the first round of the 2022 WHL prospects draft.

“We’ve met extensively about how guys need to be a star in their role,” said McDonald. “We talk a lot about guys playing certain situations with their club teams that they may not play here. They’ve handled it first-class. The bottom six have done a great job being plus-players every time they’ve been on the ice.”

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The team has felt right at home since coming to PEI, owing in part to some very familiar off-ice settings. If you were expecting the Maritimes to be a coastal paradise free of winter, Team Sask learned very quickly that was not the case.

“The ground was covered in snow and it was bone chilling cold,” McDonald said with a chuckle. “I leaned over to the guy next to me and said, did we even leave Saskatchewan, or did we just sit on the plane for four hours and they just opened the door… But it’s a beautiful island. The people here are really friendly, they remind me a lot of Saskatchewan people.”

Saskatchewan is a province that prides itself on its hockey talent, but with a smaller population than many of the other competitors in the games, the prairie province is often the underdog. It would be meaningful for McDonald and his charges to bring Saskatchewan back to the men’s hockey podium, but they’re not getting too far ahead of themselves just yet.

“The round robin is done, now our focus is on the next game,” McDonald said. “Tonight we’ll find out who our opponent will be in our quarterfinal match and that’s where our focus will be. It’s one game at a time, and for us we’ve got to start with our first shift.”

Puck drop on Thursday’s game will be at 2:00 Saskatchewan time.

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rob.mahon@pattisonmedia.com

On Twitter: @RobMahonPxP