Playing on the road with a shorthanded, banged-up team, Midget ‘A’ Hawks coach Jody Tangedal knew it would take a special effort from his players to get a good result.
Some fine goaltending helped as well.
The Hawks were able to hold on to tie the Barrhead Steelers 3-3 at the Barrhead Agrena on Jan. 15 in a game where they were outshot 18-5 in the first 10 minutes of play.
Tangedal pointed to the strong play of netminder Brady Bilsky as one of the reasons the Hawks were able to stay close early in a game where only 11 players were able to take the ice.
“We could have been four or five goals down within the first five minutes of the game,” Tangedal said. “He was miraculous and we were horrible.”
The game entered the second period tied 0-0 despite the shot disparity. During the break, Tangedal stressed to his players the need to make good decisions and let the flow of the game come to them.
“We really just dug deep,” he said. “We needed to play safe and capitalize on our opportunities and we did that.”
The Hawks were able to take control of the game in the second period, taking a two-goal lead through efforts by Jayce Matson and Lucas Duncan.
“For as badly as we played early on, we really controlled the game after that,” Tangedal said.
Unfortunately, for the Hawks a late power play goal allowed Barrhead to regain some of the momentum they lost and they only held a one-goal lead into the third period.
Barrhead was able to tie the game 2-2 early in the third, and from there it was a back-and-forth contest to the finish.
“They scored on a power play goal, and it’s one we’d like to have back,” said Tangedal. “After they tied the game, they got a little bit of momentum.”
Tyson Tymo was able to score a goal at 7:02 in the third period to give the Hawks the late lead, but the team was unable to hang on for the victory, conceding a late goal with 1:14 left to take away a 3-3 tie.
Overall, Tangedal was happy with the way his team played considering they had fewer players than usual.
“Typically, we have four lines and we were down to only two plus an extra player, so we did really well out there,” he said.
Tangedal said the team may have to call up some reserves from the ‘B’ team to be prepared for next week’s games. He said he is confident the players will be able to make the adjustment.
