Photo Credit: Taylor Lachance

By Will Bryant

Sports

Tigers rout Rebels 7-1, inch closer to home-ice advantage

Mar 7, 2025 | 10:55 PM

The Medicine Hat Tigers were all business Friday night in Red Deer.

Heading to a building that they had yet to win a game in this season, the Tigers handled the Rebels with ease, cruising to a 7-1 victory.

The Tigers wasted little time getting the scoring started.

86 seconds in, Ryder Ritchie netted his 26th of the season to get the Tigers in front 1-0.

Six minutes later the Tigers added to their advantage when Josh Van Mulligan, who assisted on the Ritchie tally saw the favour returned.

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Van Mulligan picked up a Ritchie pass alone in the slot and sniped a shot underneath the glove of Rebels netminder Peyton Shore to get the Cats ahead 2-0.

After play stalled around the midway part of the period, the Rebels would take consecutive penalties on the Tigers, leading to a 5-on-3 Tiger powerplay.

With the Tigers high-octane powerplay, they would waste little time and take a 3-0 lead.

Gavin McKenna found Tigers rookie forward Liam Ruck alone in front of the Rebels goal, and Ruck tapped the puck home for his 22nd of the season, the second most amongst WHL rookies.

The Tigers would continue to control play and head into the first intermission holding a 3-0 advantage.

The second period would see the Tigers pick up right where they left off.

After killing off a penalty to begin the frame, Ryder Ritchie stole a puck in the neutral zone and dazzled with a pair of sensational dekes to undress both Rebels defenseman Luke Vlooswyk and netminder Peyton Shore, to tuck home a back hander and make it 4-0 Tigers.

Just over a minute later, the Rebels would respond.

After a questionable hit on Tigers forward Misha Volotovskii behind the Medicine Hat goal, the puck popped in front for Rebels forward Nolan Schmidt who shoveled the puck past Harrison Meneghin to get the Rebels on the board.

The goal snapped a streak of five consecutive period of shutout hockey for Meneghin.

Undeterred, the Tigers would restore their four goal lead minutes later.

Gavin McKenna found Hunter St. Martin alone at the Red Deer blueline and sprung the Tigers leading goal scorer in alone.

St. Martin made no mistake, making a beautiful deke to the backhand to beat Shore and make it 5-1 Tigers.

Despite back and fourth play, the second would end with the Tigers still in front 5-1.

The third period would see frustration boil over from Red Deer, but the Tigers remained calm and didn’t engage in the after the whistle stuff, understanding they had more to play for.

As a result of the Red Deer shenanigans, the Tigers would head to a late powerplay in the third and took just thirteen seconds to score.

Gavin McKenna would send a shot towards the net of Shore that deflected past the Red Deer netminder to make it 6-1 Cats.

Two minutes later, the Tigers would add on for the final time.

With a penalty pending to the Rebels, Ryder Ritchie fired a seeing-eye shot through traffic that got past Shore making it 7-1 Tigers.

The goal marked Ritchie’s first career WHL hat trick and capped off a five-point night for the Minnesota Wild prospect, setting a new career high for points in a game.

Medicine Hat would close the game out and emerge with a 7-1 victory.

The win extends the Tigers win streak to six, and they now have outscored Red Deer a combined 15-2 over their last two meetings.

Their final meeting of the regular season will come next Saturday, March 15th, when the Rebels pay a visit to Co-op Place.

The Medicine Hat Tigers (43-17-3-1) will be off until next Friday, when they visit the Lethbridge Hurricanes (40-19-2-2) in a game with massive playoff implications.