Hurricanes edge Ice 2-1

By Lethbridge Herald on January 27, 2023.

Herald Photo by Justin Seward Lethbridge Hurricanes Anton Astashevich battles to a loose puck with Winnipeg Ice captain Carson Lambos during Western Hockey League action at the Enmax Centre on Friday night.

By Justin Seward

Lethbridge Herald

The Lethbridge Hurricanes passed a tough test with a 2-1 win over the Winnipeg Ice on Friday night at the Enmax Centre.

“It was a hard fought battle,” said Brent Kisio, Hurricanes head coach.

“You now I think Winnipeg is obviously, like we talked about, one of the best teams in our league. I thought we had some good moments and they had some good moments as well. It was just two teams going at it hard.”

Kisio thought the Ice had a good hard push in the third period.

“It wasn’t the start we wanted (with) them scoring (33) seconds into the period,” said Kisio.

“I was proud of the guys with the way we responded and at the end of the day Tommy (Bryan Thomson) was really good in net.”

The Canes Hayden Smith tipped in a Chase Pauls shot for his sixth goal of the season on the powerplay with 54.6 seconds left in the first period to give Lethbridge a 1-0 lead heading into the first intermission.

“We knew coming into this game that we would have to get a special teams goal and try to win that battle,” said Kisio.

Joe Arntsen drew the  other assist on Smith’s goal.

The Ice tied the game at one  just 33 seconds into the third period, as Connor McClennon backhanded in his 23rd of the season from Matthew Savoie.

The Hurricanes pulled ahead 2-1 after Smith tracked down a mishandled puck by Ice goalie Mason Beaupit, and quickly passed it out to Blake Swetlikoff to deposit into an empty net at 10:44 of third period.

“It’s big, said Kisio, on beating the first place Ice.

“Any win for us right now is big. It’s a credit to our guys and how they’re playing.”

The Canes split the season series with the Ice as both teams had two wins a piece.

“It was definitely like a playoff game for sure,” said Smith.

“That’s the way we’re going to have to play if we end up playing a team like that in playoffs.”

Smith agreed the team stuck to their structure.

“Against a skilled team like Winnipeg, that’s the way you’ve got to play. And yeah we definitely stuck to it and shut them down. Like one goal against for a team like Winnipeg is pretty good.”

The Hurricanes went 1-for-5 and the Ice had no goals on two attempts on the powerplay.

Lethbridge will hit the road to play the Edmonton Oil Kings at 4 p.m. on Sunday.

It was prior to the game that former Hurricanes  Nathan Barrett, Bob Loucks, and Mike Moller were inducted into the Lethbridge Hurricanes Wall of Honour.