Estevan walked off their home ice Tuesday night with a win in Game 3, after mounting a 3-0 comeback (Ben Tompkins/northeastNOW Staff)

By Ben Tompkins

Better finish, more discipline needed for game 4

Mustangs penalty trouble leads to disappointing collapse against Bruins

Mar 27, 2024 | 2:54 PM

The Melfort Mustangs had the opportunity on Tuesday night to take a 3-0 stranglehold over the Estevan Bruins in their best-of-seven first-round series.

Unfortunately, for the Mustangs, that chance slipped through their fingers as they failed to close a 3-0 lead midway through Game 3 and fell, 4-3.

“The selfish penalties hurt us; you can’t be taking those penalties in playoffs, it just hurts the mojo and the energy and then coming to play flat, you got to play a full 60 on the road and you got to be hard on all cylinders, and that wasn’t the case for us tonight,” assistant coach Tye Scherger, told northeastNOW.

“We knew they were down 2-0, we knew they were going to come out hard and heavy and they did and we didn’t respond. So tomorrow, we need to turn the momentum around right out the gates, be heavy, be on them consistently the whole game and be on top of the pucks all through the zones.”

Through 35 minutes, Melfort had the Estevan bench looking quite deflated, as a shorthanded breakaway goal by Logan Belton put them up by three.

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Those penalties immediately bit the Stangs in the butt, however, as the Bruins scored three powerplay goals in the final five minutes of the second period, to send it into the final frame as a tie game.

The Blue and Green then gave up another powerplay marker, with just less than 3:30 in the game, and then just failed to tie it late.

“First off, you can’t be taken those penalties again and second off, we were just missing plays, guys were misreading plays and then it’s in the back of our net,” Scherger added.

“Today’s a new day, you gotta have that mentality where it’s fresh, it’s a new day, and the sun comes up, so we got to be hard for a full 60 and be ready to go.”

Opening faceoff for Game 4 is once again scheduled for 7 p.m. as either a 3-1 series or a 2-2 tie will be the case later tonight.

Game 5 is also now certain, which will go on Friday night at the Northern Lights Palace, beginning at 7:30 p.m.

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Ben.Tompkins@pattisonmedia.com

On X @BenTompkins_8