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Cubs trounced by Coaldale in second straight pre-season meeting

Sep 17, 2017 | 4:37 PM

MEDICINE HAT, AB – Two blowout losses in a row capped off a pre-season to forget for the Medicine Hat Travelodge Cubs, as they wound up their exhibition play against the Coaldale Copperheads on Sunday.

The Cubs were coming off a 10-2 beating at the hands of the Copperheads in Coaldale on Saturday, and were looking to finish off the pre-season in style.

It was a solid start for the boys in white on Sunday, with Medicine Hat and Coaldale skating into the first intermission with the game tied at 1-1.

Things changed drastically in the second period however, as the Copperheads dominated possession and scored seven goals to take an 8-2 lead over Medicine Hat at the break.

Much of the same occurred in the final 20 minutes of play, with the Cubs allowing seven more Coaldale goals and falling to the Copperheads by a 15-2 final.

Cubs assistant coach Brandon Stahl said the team lost a lot of momentum in the middle frame.

“We had a lot of compete in the first period,” said Stahl. “We were battling with them, we were there head-to-head the whole time. The second period got away from us a little bit, we weren’t sticking to our game plan, we broke down a little bit in our own end. But, it’s a learning curve, it’s the pre-season, that’s why we’re here to fix our mistakes.”

With the loss, Medicine Hat finishes the pre-season with a 0-2 record and were outscored by the Copperheads 25-4 over the course of the two games.

While the losses were a step backwards for the team, Cubs centre Mackenzie Fritzler said it was great getting back to game speed after a few weeks of practices and training camp.

“It’s good, it gets us back into the speed,” said Fritzler. “Some of these guys like I said are in [bantam] AA, they come into this and said, ‘Woah is it fast.’”

Medicine Hat will be looking to improve on their 11th place finish in the standings last year, when the finished the regular season with an 8-24-6 record.

Fritzler said the team will have to work out some kinks defensively in practice before starting the regular season next weekend.

“We’re going to have to take that high guy,” he said. “We got to keep back-checking, keep one of our guys high so we’re not just going on a two-on-one back with them.”

The Cubs officially kick start their 2017-18 HJHL campaign on Friday, when they travel to Didsbury to face the Mountainview Colts.