(Photo courtesy/Broad Leaf Media, Facebook)

By Ben Tompkins

Second place on the line

Mustangs heading to the ‘Fords’ to ‘Battle’ with North Stars

Mar 1, 2024 | 1:00 PM

The Melfort Mustangs are heading on the road this weekend for arguably their most important games of the season to date.

Melfort will travel to Battlefords to take on the North Stars for a pair of contests, as the two fight for second place in the SJHL standings.

“This weekend is huge, we all gotta come prepared because it just depends on who we play in playoffs and we know we want to be one of the top teams, so we just got to come ready to play and battle,” said forward Austin Shepherd, who scored his first career SJHL goal on Wednesday.

As it stands right now, the Mustangs are just a single point behind Battlefords for the number two spot, with just six games remaining on the schedule for each club.

That means this weekend will serve as a potential eight-point swing, with the possibility of the Stangs being three points ahead or five points behind come Sunday.

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For the Blue and Green, the possibilities seem to be a bit in their favour, as they’re currently on a four-game win streak, while the North Stars are losers of their last three, including two against non-playoff teams.

Melfort is also 2 and 0 in the season series so far, outscoring their opponents 7-2.

“We gotta keep our jam up and compete every night, they’re a completely different team than when we played them in November, so it’s gonna be a good game, it’s like a playoff game. It’s going to be two big games in Battlefords, just gotta come into every battle ready to go, with every one of them set to be huge,” Shepherd added.

“We just want to keep the momentum up the next shift and just play simple hockey after a goal or when we get the lead because any team can come back, which we saw on Wednesday. We gotta stay defensive-minded and just make the simple plays because defending is the biggest thing.”

Another key for the Mustangs as of late has been their offence, as they’ve scored seven goals in back-to-back matches.

Two big factors to that have been the play of their very best in Aidyn Hutchinson and Clay Sleeva, who are coming off six and five-point performances respectively.

“It’s great watching them, just following their footsteps for the next years, they’ve created a good path for us and they’ll be great for the future,” Shepherd told northeastNOW.

Puck drop for both matchups is scheduled for 7:30 p.m., with the Suncrest College pregame show beginning at 7:15 p.m. on 105 CJVR and CJVR.com.

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Ben.Tompkins@pattisonmedia.com

On X @BenTompkins_8