With nationally-televised curling taking up the Civic Centre, the Battlefords North Stars must make the best of life on the road.
The North Stars won't be back home until Jan.22. This week, they were in eastern Saskatchewan hoping to get back into the win column against the Yorkton Terriers on Friday night and versus Melville Millionaires on Saturday. Their weekend trip proved successful; the North Stars won both games by identical 5-2 scores to move back into second place in the division with 52 points, three back of first place Kindersley.
North Stars 5 Yorkton 2
The North Stars and Terriers had a scoreless but entertaining first period, but that all changed in the second when the North Stars exploded with four goals.
Brett Gammer got things started at 3:45 of period 2, and Cody Spagrud added one more just 40 seconds later. Gammer then got his second of the game exactly one minute later at the 5:25 mark, on the power play.
MacGregor Sinclair's 15th of the season from Spagrud and Lamb on the power play at 12:27 rounded out the scoring in the second; he also notched assists on the previous two goals.
That brought out the hook for Yorkton netminder Ryan Ouellette, replaced the rest of the way by Andrew Henderson.
The third period saw the two teams trade goals as Cole Keenleyside scored his tenth of the season for the Terriers while Quintin Loon-Stewardson answered with his eighth of the season for the North Stars.
Jared Legien added a second Yorkton goal with 2:59 left for his 30th goal of the season, but that was it.
Chad Duran had an excellent night in net for the North Stars, stopping 31 shots for the win. The North Stars outshot the Terriers 41-33 on the night, including 18-4 in the second period. .
North Stars 5 Melville 2
The North Stars completed the sweep of the weekend by beating the Millionaires on the road. Melville got on the board first with a goal from Sam De Melo in the first period, but the North Stars responded with five unanswered.
It was the MacGregor Sinclair show in Melville. It started with Sinclair scoring shorthanded one minute into period two, and then he got an assist on another shorthanded goal scored by Owen Lamb, Matthew Fletcher also assisting.
Sinclair then scored on the power play from Gammer and Lamb at 14:43, and then scored his hat trick goal at 8:50 of the third period.
Elijah Loon-Stewardson rounded out the scoring, with Quinton Loon-Stewardson and Noah Form assisting. Tristan Shewchuk scored the last goal for Melville with two seconds left on the clock for a 5-2 final score.
Joel Grzybowski got the win in net, stopping 23 of 25 shots. The North Stars now enjoy a few days off as the SJHL/MJHL Showcase goes on in Regina.
