Weekend Preview: Raiders set for two East Division battles

Looking into the special teams battle, the Raiders powerplay has struck at least once in each of their last two games, so they’re sitting fifth in the league at 27.7%. With their third shorthanded goal of the season on Sunday, the Raiders penalty kill is sitting 11th in the league at 78.4%.

Daxon Rudolph is the first player to the 70-point mark with 27G-43A-70P. Aiden Oiring now has the team lead in goals, and sits second in points with 28G-40A-68P. Brandon Gorzynski sits third with 27G-40A-67P, and Max Heise found two goals over the weekend to bring him to 26G-33A-59P.

Scoring streaks:

Justice Christensen has 2G-1A in his last two games

Fans can expect the weekend to be split between Raiders goaltenders Michal Orsulak and Steele Bass. Orsulak won both games he played this past weekend to improve to 24-4-4 on the season, a 0.905 save percentage, a 2.34 goals against average, and two shutouts on the year. As for Bass, he surrendered just one goal in the Saturday loss in Red Deer, and comes in with a record of 10-4-1, a 0.908 save percentage, a 2.07 goals against average, and also two shutouts this year.

Friday vs. Moose Jaw

The Raiders start the weekend by welcoming the Moose Jaw Warriors for the sixth and final meeting of the season. The Raiders are 5-0 against Moose Jaw this season – most recently after a 6-2 win on Feb. 20.

The Warriors are currently sitting just outside of the playoffs right now. They currently sit tied with the Red Deer Rebels for the eighth place spot in the Eastern Conference, but Moose Jaw has one less game left to play. Their record sits at 24-34-5 on the year.

The Warriors have won their last two games, 4-3 in a shootout with Swift Current on Wednesday, and 7-3 over Lethbridge on Saturday. Warriors are 3-1 in their last four games, but 4-6 in their last ten.

The Warriors powerplay has improved in the standings since the last time they saw the Raiders, now up to eighth in the league at 26.1%. Their penalty kill has dropped, however, and sits worst in the league at 70.3%.

Landen McFadden leads the way for the Warriors with 32G-36A-68P, followed closely by Pavel McKenzie 17G-48A-65P. Aiden Ziprick sits third with 17G-36A-53P, and finally Ethan Semeniuk rounds out the top four with 16G-25A-41P.

Scoring streaks:

Casey Brown has 2G-2A in his last two games

Dominik Pavlik has 1G-1A in his last two games

In goal for the Warriors, Chase Wutzke has done the bulk of the work this year with a record of 14-22-4, a 0.905 save percentage, a 3.34 goals against average, and one shutout this year. Kyle Jones has played the Raiders just once, the most recent matchup on Feb. 20 where he gave up five goals on 43 shots. This season, Jones has a record of 7-12-3, a 0.866 save percentage, and a 4.89 goals against average.

Puck drop between the Raiders and the Warriors is set for 7 p.m. at the Art Hauser Centre Friday night.

Saturday @ Regina

As for Saturday’s matchup, the Raiders will head out on the road for the first of two games this week with the Regina Pats. The Raiders are 5-1-0 this season in six games against the Pats. The Pats lone win of the season series was in Regina 5-4 on Dec. 17.

The Pats are sitting comfortable in the seventh place spot in the Eastern Conference with a five point lead on Red Deer and Moose Jaw behind them. With five games left to play, the Pats need just four points to clinch a spot, although that number becomes ‘two’ if the Raiders beat Moose Jaw on Friday.

The Pats are also returning from an Alberta road trip where they finished with a 4-2 win on Wednesday over Lethbridge. Ahead of that though, the Pats lost 6-0 Tuesday in Medicine Hat, and 4-3 in overtime in Calgary on Sunday. The Pats are 3-2-1 in their last six games.

On the powerplay the Pats are in the top half of the league, just barely at 10th, operating at about 25.2%. On the penalty kill, the Pats are in the bottom four of the league at 20th, operating at 72%.

Caden Brown leads the Pats in scoring this year with 28G-32A-60P. Keets Fawcett sits second with 29G-29A-58P, and then there’s a tie for third between Zach Lansard with 22G-29A-51P and Ephram McNutt with 12G-39A-51P.

The Pats don’t have any active scoring streaks after being shut out two games ago.

Finally, in goal, the Pats will run with the tandem of Marek Schlenker and Taylor Tabashniuk. Schlenker has a record of 18-15-7, a 0.886 save percentage, a 3.70 goals against average, and one shutout this year. As for Taylor Tabashniuk, he has a 5-8-0 record, a 0.871 save percentage, and a 4.17 goals against average.

The puck drops in Regina on Saturday at 6 p.m.

You can listen in to both games on Brandt Raider Radio and 900 CKBI, starting with the pregame show half hour before game time.

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nick.nielsen@pattisonmedia.com

by Nick Nielsen

Weekend Preview: Raiders set for two East Division battles

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