Photo by Brandi Crowe
Brandon, MB (CKLQ) – Baron Thompson’s first career WHL hat-trick lifted the Brandon Wheat Kings to a 7-5 win over the Kootenay ICE on Saturday night.
In the second meeting in 24 hours, the Wheat Kings were looking to build off the momentum of a 5-4 win on Friday night.
Stelio Mattheos would open the scoring for Brandon on the powerplay as he notched his 30th of the season on a great setup from Zach Wytinck.
Moments later, Jaeger White would tie the game taking the feed from former Virden Oil Capital Marco Creta and burying his 19th of the year into the open net.
Brandon restored the lead on the powerplay, their 2nd of the night when Luka Burzan poked home his 27th of the year after following a driving Cole Reinhardt to the goalmouth.
Before the buzzer to signify the end of the first, with Jonny Lambos in the box for Brandon, his younger brother Carson would snap home his first WHL goal. The powerplay goal would send the teams to the room deadlocked at two.
After an early 2nd period goal by the ICE, the Wheat Kings scored three unanswered goals to storm out to a 5-3 lead.
Baron Thompson scored two goals in 3:37 seconds before Cole Reinhardt finished off the period with a beautiful backhand deke on a late breakaway.
The ICE came out flying in the third, scoring twice in 1:21 to tie the game back up. With all the momentum on the Kootenay side, Thompson sent the hat’s flying with a redirected point shot to restore the lead.
Brandon would ice it with an empty netter, winning consecutive games for the first time since December 4th.
Five Wheat Kings finished multi-point nights while Jiri Patera turned aside 15 shots for his 15th win of the season.
The Wheat Kings are now off until Friday when they open up a weekend home-and-home series with the Regina Pats.
SCORING SUMMARY
1st PERIOD
BWK – Stelio Mattheos (30) (Wytinck, Gutenberg) 14:13 PPG
KTN – Jaeger White (19) (Creta, Hartje) 15:35
BWK – Luka Burzan (27) (Reinhardt, Mattheos) 16:26 PPG
KTN – Carson Lambos (1) (Muir, Hartje) PPG
Shots: 13-5 Brandon
2nd PERIOD
KTN – Jaeger White (20) (Unassisted) 1:10 4on4
BWK – Baron Thompson (3) (Unassisted) 13:01
BWK – Baron Thompson (4) (Wytinck, Daley) 16:48
BWK – Cole Reinhardt (12) (Unassisted) 18:27
Shots: 11-9 Kootenay
3rd PERIOD
KTN – Jakin Smallwood (7) (Muir, Hartje) 1:04
KTN – Austin Schellenberg (4) (Ginnell, Pedersen) 1:21
BWK – Baron Thompson (5) (Chizen, Greig) 6:27
BWK – Cole Reinhardt (13) (Gutenberg) 19:04 EN
Final Shots: 34-22 Brandon