The Blackfalds Bulldogs are facing elimination after a 10-3 loss to the Sherwood Park Crusaders on Tuesday night. The Crusaders now lead the best-of-seven series 3-0 in the British Columbia Hockey League (BCHL) Alberta Division Semifinals.
Ryder Ringor tipped in a point shot at 5:03 of the first period to make it a 1-0 Crusaders game with the assists on the goal going to Cade Christiansen and Zac Maxwell.
A caged Adam Raesler made it a 2-0 Crusaders game at 4:25 of the first period with the assists going to Black Ace Cameron Caron and Ryan Zaremba. I am assuming Raesler has a facial injury he doesn’t seem like the type of player to want to wear a face shield.
Alexander Dimitriadis gets the Bulldogs on the board at 5:02 of the first period to make it a 2-1 game. The assists on the goal went to Luke Dahlen and Trent LeDrew.
Shots on goal in the first period were 10-9 for the Crusaders
Logan Hauer made it a 4-1 game for the Crusaders capitalizing on a a Bulldogs turnover, unassisted just 2 minutes into the second period to make it a 3-1 game. That was the end of Gabe Gratton’s night. It was apparent to everyone in the stands that he was injured or sore before hand. In came call up Sam Caulfield.
Tanner Willick scored for the Bulldogs when he found a clearing and went five hole on Roest just 45 seconds later at 2:45 of the second period to make it a 4-2 game with the assists on the goal going to Dakota MacIntosh and Brendan Ross.
Ethan Merner, who was recently named Alberta Division player of the week, made it a 5-2 game for the Crusaders. A Bulldog player passed that right on Merner’s tape too. All in all a great pass just to the wrong team.
Kale Dach made it a 6-2 game on the Power Play at 15:04 of the second period with the assists on the goal going to Nick Wellenreiter and Colle Assailly.
And its not that the Bulldogs didn’t have chances this period. They just weren’t finishing on them. Usually against the Crusaders you can usually chalk it up to Roest shutting the door. Roest never even got tested. There were numerous times where the Bulldogs would go down have a great chance and then miss the net all together. Only for the Crusaders to come down and score. When the Crusaders took shots they had the intention to score.
Shots in the second period were 16-12 for the Bulldogs
The Crusaders scored 5 unanswered goals in the third period from Wellenreiter, Zaremba, Dach, Maxwell, and Frost.
Brendan Ross scored for the Bulldogs with 12 seconds left in the game with the assist going to Alexander Dimitriadis.
Shots on goal in the third period were 15-7 for the Crusaders. The Crusaders outshot the Bulldogs 37-32 in the game
Erik Roest made 29 saves on the 32 shots that he faced for the win for the Crusaders. Gabe Gratton made 8 saves on the 11 shots that he faced for the Bulldogs until leaving the game at 2 minutes into the second period after the 3rd goal. He was replaced by call up Sam Caulfield who made 19 saves on the 26 shots that he faced.
Three Stars of the game 1) Kale Dach 2) Logan Hauer 3) Ryder Ringor
Attendance in Blackfalds was 932
Bulldogs next game is Wednesday April 24th at 7pm in Blackfalds.
Sam Caulfield is from Needham, Massachusetts and played for Milton Academy this season. Have to hand it to the kid getting hucked into his first junior game under circumstances such as this.
