The Yorkton Terriers have taken the first two games in their best-of-seven Sherwood Conference with Estevan.
The Terriers won the series opener on Farrell Agencies Arena ice Saturday, then won Game two of the Saskatchewan Junior Hockey League in Estevan.
Monday night in Game Two in the Bruins barn it was an up and down affair from the get-go.
Robbie Ciolfi gave the Terriers a 1-0 lead 1:06 into the first, but the Bruins responded with three goals, two on the powerplay 48 seconds apart, to enjoy a 3-1 lead after 20-minutes.
Mark Cross, Dylan Smith and Dominic Perrault had the Bruin markers.
The second period swung Yorkton's way as they pumped in three unanswered goals for a 4-3 lead.Ciolfi had two to complete a hat trick night, with Nathan Murray added the single.
In the third Jeremy Boyer made it 5-3 Terriers with a marker at the midway point of the period.
But the Bruins would make it a one goal contest when Ben Findlay scored 3:30 later, but that would be the last marker scored in the 5-4 Terrier win.
Warren Shymko had the win in the Terrier net, while former Terrier Joel Danyluk took the loss for the Bruins.Terrier head coach Trent Cassan said in spite of the quick goal it takes times to settle into a game in Estevan."It takes a little bit to get used to everything that happens there," he said.
What Cassan was happy to see was the team's response to the adversity of getting down 3-1 after the first period.
"I've seen so many times you get down and start panicking, and you're just fighting against yourself," he said, adding in the intermission, "some guys were disappointed."
But the Terrier coach said he reminded the team, "it's 60-minutes. It's a long game It's a long series. We're not going to win every period in the series.
"You can't be thinking too much about a couple of things that didn't go right in the first period. You've still got 40-minutes to go out and make a difference."
The message obviously got through as the Terriers rebounded with their three unanswered second period goals. A big part of the turnaround was Ciolfi who stepped up his game.
"He was really good," said Cassan, adding with only nine regular forwards the veteran was double-shifted most of the game. "He was really good right from the start of the game."
While the hat trick shows on the scoresheet, Cassan said Ciolfi was contributing in all aspects of the game, taking a key face-off late in the third, and sacrificing his body blocking shots defensively.
The series openerThe Terriers may not have been in a game for more than two weeks, but there was no sign of rust Saturday as they outshot the Bruins 17-3 in the first period and led 3-0 on the scoreboard.
Jeremy Boyer opened the scoring with a short-handed effort, with Riley Patterson and Craig Eisenhut also beating Estevan netminder Shea Cooper.
The Bruins got on the score sheet late in the second taking advantage of a long two-man advantage when Calder Neufeld finally got one past Warren Shymko.
Jonathon Ceci pulled the Bruins within one with a goal 6:05 into the third, but an empty net marker by Terrier Zak Majkowski in the final minute of the third secured a 4-2 win for the home team.
Boyer said it was just good to get back into action after more than two weeks as the league wrapped up its regular season, and then awaited the winner of the Sherwood Conference survivor series.
"How we started, everybody was excited," he said, adding while the Terriers still had injured players out of the line-up (Justin Buzzeo, and Blaine Tendler among them), other "guys kind of stepped up," and did the job.
Boyer said the key over the time off was to "keep yourself in shape You've got to take care of yourself off the ice." He added from the performance in Game One, "everybody did a good job of that."
Cassan said in practice they tried to simulate game situations with mini-games where the players did play hard and physical, but it still wasn't a real game situation. He added, "not knowing who you're going to play until basically a day before," kept the focus "more about what we wanted to do," rather than for a particular team.
Still Cassan said the Terriers came out and played a spirited game from the drop of the puck, noting "it was the style of play we wanted to play on home ice The first period I thought we attacked with a lot of speed."Certainly in the first period the Terriers poured it on with 17-shots.
"I thought their goalie made some great saves," he said, adding Cooper's glove was especially sharp including robbing Boyer himself on an early breakaway. " I was trying to shoot top right corner, but I shot it a little low and it went right into his glove."
Cassan said while the Terriers could have had more goals in the first if not for Cooper's performance the team "didn't dwell on it and get down. They kept pushing."
Up nextGame 3 of the series will be played tonight (Wednesday) at Farrell Agencies Arena in the city, with Game 4 set for Estevan Friday.
Game 5 goes in Yorkton Saturday, with Game 6 in Estevan Tuesday, and Game 7 next Wednesday (March 16) back in the Terrier barn.
