Quite a contrast in the two games this past weekend between the Flin Flon Bombers and Melfort Mustangs.
The two teams hooked up in a home and home with the Bombers winning on Friday 6 to 3 at the Whitney Forum.
Despite giving up a goal to Danton Cox less than two minutes into the game the Bombers had one of their best efforts of the year.
All the big guns got going with Carter Anderson and Koen Seft leading the way with a pair of goals. Senft had a career night picking up 5 points including three assists.
17 year old local product Wyatt Stinton scored his first ever SJHL goal when he was the recipient of a nice pass behind the Melfort net from Carter Cormier.
Cormier also scored his third of the year on the powerplay late in the game to seel it.
The other Melfort goals came from Kaleb Binner and Zayden Sadlemyer.
17 year old goaltender Massimo Urbani kept up his winning ways by stopping 27 out of 30 for his fourth win of the year. Kristian Coombs played very well despite taking the loss with 34 saves on 39 shots and stopped Carter Anderson on two clear cut break aways.
After a slow start this season on the powerplay, the Bombers went 2 for 6 and now sit third overall with the man advantage.
Saturday was a totally different game at the Palace in Melfort. A tough break for the Bombers as Carter Anderson wasn't able to go due to taking a puck in the hand the night before.
So Flin Flon was without the services of three dominant 20 year old's including Keefe Gruener and Kylynn Olafson who got injured on the last road trip.
Flin Flon was hoping to bring the momentum into Melfort after their big win on Friday, but got into penalty trouble early and were assessed four straight penalties and found themselves down 2 men for almost 4 minutes.
The Bombers almost killed it off , but Reilley Kotai was able to beat Kenny Marquart with a low wrister with just under a minute remaining on the two man advantage and the Mustangs never looked back.
Leading 1-0 in the second the Mustangs caught fire and scored three goals in a span of just under 3 minutes to take control at 4-0.
Logan Belton, Jake Giacobbo and Kaleb Binner all found the back of the net.
Anthony Piccininno scored his first of the season early in the third for Flin Flon but was the only Bomber player to beat Kristian Coombs on this night who made 29 saves.
Not to take anything away from Coombs, but he didn't have to make a lot of difficult saves as the Mustangs did an excellent job on shutting down the Flin Flon attack. You could count on one hand how many really good offensive chances the Bombers got.
Kenny Marquart suffered the loss for Flin Flon and made 32 saves on 36 shots and was the best Bomber player on this night. Marquart held his team in the game with many great stops and kept it from being a 12 to 1 game.
Marquart has not had a lot of offensive support as the Bombers have only scored 11 goals in the 5 games that Kenny has started in contrast to the 19 goals they have scored in the four games that Urbani has started.
Flin Flon will fall to 5-4-1 and sit second in the Sherwood behind Melfort who is 6-2 after their dominant win on Saturday.
The Bombers will get ready to welcome the Weyburn Red Wings to town this weekend who will be bringing their high octave offense to the Whitney Forum.
The Wings are flying after out scoring Notre Dame and Yorkton 13 to 5 on the weekend and have become one of the most dangerous teams in the league.
This will be a great test for Flin Flon as it will also be Parent's Weekend and you will be able to catch Saturday's game on 102.9 CFAR and flinflononline.com.
