Red Deer Rebels Ben King (14) and Jace Weir (8) search for puck with Edmonton Oil King Jalen Luypen also in the hunt on April 16, 2022 at the Peavey Mart Centrium. (Red Deer Rebels/Rob Wallator)

By Josh Hall (Twitter: @Vancan19)

now for the "main event"

Rebels drop season finale, and, “no one is satisfied,” says coach ahead of playoffs

Apr 16, 2022 | 10:38 PM

The Red Deer Rebels have had a playoff spot pretty well locked up for several weeks, and after Saturday night, they can finally look forward to playing their first post-season game in a few years.

Red Deer wrapped up its regular season at the Centrium on Saturday, taking on one of the country’s top teams, and their divisional rival, the Edmonton Oil Kings. The Rebels had won five of nine against Edmonton coming in.

Other storylines to watch included the goals and points race.

Entering the game, Arshdeep Bains led the league in points in 110, virtually uncatchable, with second place being Bains’ own linemate Ben King at 103. But right behind him with 102 was Logan Stankoven of the Kamloops Blazers who had game 68 to go Saturday against Vancouver.

And in the goal race, King led the league coming in with 52, but Regina’s phenom Connor Bedard, with games Saturday and Sunday, was hot on his tail at 49.

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It was not the ideal start for Red Deer against Edmonton on this go-round, giving up two goals in the first period to Carter Souch (22nd) at 14:21 and Carter Kowalyk (2nd) at 18:02. Shots were 12 apiece after 20 minutes, and Edmonton led 2-0.

In the middle frame, Edmonton extended its lead, Jake Neighbours (17th) potting one at 7:53, and on the power play with Jayden Grubbe in the box for high sticking. It was 3-0 after 40 minutes.

Red Deer finally got on the board in the third, and early. as Liam Keeler (25th) got assists from dynamic duo Ben King and Arshdeep Bains at 1:15 to make it 3-1.

At 11:56, Bains (43rd) drew the Rebels to within one, King getting another assist, and Jace Weir adding a helper also, on the power play.

A late chance with an empty net at four-on-four did not yield an equalizer for the Rebels, and game 68 ended 3-2 Edmonton.

Edmonton went 1/9 on the power play, while Red Deer was 1/8. The final shot tally was 31-21 in favour of Red Deer.

The three stars of the night were Arshdeep Bains (first), Liam Keeler (second) and Jackson van de Leest (third).

Chase Coward stopped 13 of 16 shots Saturday before being pulled. Coward finishes 22-10-0-2 on the season with a .906 SV%, and 2.51 GAA.

His net-mate Connor Ungar came in in relief and stopped all five shots faced. He finishes with a record of 21-9-1-0, a .911 SV%, and 2.43 GAA.

“I thought the guys battled hard in the third, and gave themselves a chance to win. The game didn’t have a lot of flow, and it’s maybe not the way you want to play out the last game of the season, but that’s the way it was, and there was a lot of emotion, especially for the last game,” said Head Coach Steve Konowalchuk post-game. “It’s not a game we’ll spend a lot of time dissecting. It’s time to get moving forward here.”

Konowalchuk was complimentary of his squad’s entire season.

“I’m very happy for the players. They worked hard every day, and it was an easy team to coach because they always wanted to get better. There’s really good character and culture here,” said Konowalchuk, who took over behind the bench from Brent Sutter last summer.

“The main event is just starting here and no one is satisfied. Everybody wants to build on what we’ve done, because winning is fun.”

END OF SEASON STATS

Record: 45-19-2-2
Home: 22-10-0-2
Away: 23-9-2-0
Standings: 2nd in Central Division, 3rd in Eastern Conference

Points:
1) Arshdeep Bains: 112 (1st in WHL)
2) Ben King: 105 (2nd in WHL)*
3) Christoffer Sedoff: 61

Goals:
1) Ben King: 52 (1st in WHL)*
2) Arshdeep Bains: 43 (T-6th in WHL)
3) Liam Keeler: 25

Assists:
1) Arshdeep Bains: 69 (1st in WHL)
2) Christoffer Sedoff: 54
3) Ben King: 53

*KAM Logan Stankoven (102 points) playing Saturday; Stankoven earned two points Saturday to hit 104, one behind King to end the season. REG Connor Bedard (49 goals) playing Saturday and Sunday; Bedard had zero goals against WPG on Saturday.

Bains’s 112 points are good for the fourth best regular season total in Rebels franchise history, with Justin Mapletoft (120), Craig Reichert (119) and BJ Young (114) ahead of him. With his two points Saturday, he surpassed Dean Tiltgen’s 111 point season in 1992-93.

Bains’s 209 career points are also the seventh most in franchise history, accrued over five seasons. Meantime, King’s 171 points rank 15th behind the 177 of Ryan Nugent-Hopkins.

“It was a remarkable regular season for those guys, and in a hard-fought, chippy game, they were going at it creating chances. I don’t know if you can give one of them MVP over the other… flip a coin,” added Konowalchuk. “They complement each other really well. It’s been a good line for us all season, they are leaders on this team, and they’ve lived up to the challenge.”

Next up for the Red Deer Rebels… Game 1 of the WHL Playoffs opening round at home against the Brandon Wheat Kings. Puck drop is at 7 p.m. this coming Friday, April 22 at 7 p.m. The pre-game will be live on 106.7 REWIND Radio starting at 6:30.