The Red Deer Rebels celebrate a 5-1 victory against the Saskatoon Blades at the Peavey Mart Centrium Friday night. (Red Deer Rebels/ Rob Wallator)

By Alessia Proietti

Shy of a shutout

Rebels dominate Blades with 5-1 victory

Jan 27, 2023 | 11:07 PM

Following a 4-2 setback to the Hitmen in Calgary last weekend, the Red Deer Rebels returned to game action with a vengeance Friday night, downing the Saskatoon Blades in convincing fashion, 5-1 at the Peavey Mart Centrium.

In the first period, the Rebels’ Kai Uchacz scored his 37^th goal of the season on a rebound off Blades goaltender Ethan Chadwick. Just over three and a half minutes into the game, the seeing eye goal was assisted by Frantisek Formanek and Christoffer Sedoff, putting the team on the board 1-0.

After 20 minutes of play, Saskatoon slightly outshot the Rebels 11-10.

Early in the middle frame, Red Deer’s Carson Birnie was given penalties for major interference, served by Frantisek Formanek, and a game misconduct when he gave a big hit to Saskatoon’s Justin Lies causing him to hit his head on the glass and be taken off by stretcher.

Saskatoon Blades’ Justin Lies gets taken off the ice by stretcher after a hard hit into the glass. (rdnewsNOW/Alessia Proietti)

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While the Blades didn’t capitalize on the power play opportunity, the Rebels’ Kalan Lind scored instead on a one-timer from the high slot. His 15^th goal of the season, scoring six goals in the past seven games, Blades’ goaltender Ethan Chadwick didn’t even see the shot go into the net at 12:09. Assisted by Kai Uchacz and Frantisek Formanek, the Rebels led 2-0.

Not even a minute later, the puck bounced into Saskatoon’s net from a shot by Red Deer’s Christoffer Sedoff. The goal was initially waived off, however, due to incidental contact with the Rebels’ Ben King and Blades’ netminder Ethan Chadwick, it was later ruled a good goal by the officials. After the review, the goal was awarded to Red Deer’s Dwayne Jean Jr., his fifth goal of the season, with Christoffer Sedoff and Ben King claiming the assists. The home team pushed their lead to 3-0.

And as Saskatoon’s Spencer Shugrue sat in the box for holding, Red Deer’s Ben King scored his seventh goal this season on the power play from the face-off dot in the top corner. The goal officially tied King with former Rebels player Jonathan Zukiwsky for seventh in all-time scoring for the franchise with 87 goals.

Assists on the historic marker went to Frantisek Formanek and Hunter Mayo at 14:22, and put the Rebels up 4-0.

At this point, the Blades changed goaltender Ethan Chadwick for Austin Elliot.

By the end of the second period, the Blades had again more shots on goal compared to the Rebels (15-12).

In the final period, Red Deer’s Kai Uchacz scored his 38^th goal this season and second of the game, tapping in his own rebound at 10:31. Assisted by Hunter Mayo, the team was now leading 5-0.

Then at 13:34, the Blades’ Egor Sidorov scored his 26^th goal of the season on Rebels netminder Kyle Kelsey, spoiling a possible shutout for Red Deer’s netminder. Assisted by Charlie Wright and Ben Saunderson, the final score showed 5-1 for the Rebels.

The Blades outshot the Rebels in the third period 9-5 and overall 35-27.

The Blades went 0/3 on the power play while the Rebels went 1/2 with the man advantage.

Rebels Coach Steve Konowalchuk said the team played well but missed moments to “finish checks when the opportunity is there.”

“We have some guys that usually bring it but we want to get more consistent with everybody bringing the physical play, the skating,” he said.

The Rebels earned all three stars this evening with Frantisek Formanek given the third star for his three assists. Goaltender Kyle Kelsey was awarded the second star for his 34 saves on 35 shots, while Kai Uchacz took home the first star for his two goals and one assist.

Rebels goaltender Kyle Kesley said he felt “dialed in” after his return from a lower body injury.

“I saw a lot of pucks for sure. I mean we unfortunately had to kill a lot, especially those longer penalties, the four minutes, the five minutes, those were obviously draining throughout the game but we stayed strong,” he said.

The Rebels will play against the Winnipeg ICE Saturday, Jan. 28, at the Peavey Mart Centrium. Face-off is 7 p.m. with the broadcast live on 106.7 REWIND Radio.