Blades eliminated by archrival Raiders in six games

Time has expired on the Saskatoon Blades playoff run.

The Blades lost 6-3 to the Prince Albert Raiders on Sunday to lose their best-of-seven Eastern Conference series 4-2.

Saskatoon battled and fought, but in the end, the league-leading Raiders were too much to handle down the stretch, with a 6-1 loss on Friday forcing the Blades into Sunday’s do-or-die game in front of an announced crowd of 10,521 at Sasktel Centre.

“We gave that team everything we had,” Dawson Davidson said following the season-ending loss.

“We’re not hanging our heads.” We made a lot of strides as an organization this year and hopefully that helps moving forward.”

The second round exit is a positive result for a Blades team making the playoffs for the first time since 2013.

“The initial reaction is disappointment, but at the end of the day, that’s a good hockey team over there,” Blades head coach Mitch Love said after his first season in charge of the team.

Prince Albert was finally able to solve Blades goaltender Nolan Maier after the 18-year-old rescued two victories for his team in games 3 and 4.

“Justice was served,” Raiders head coach Marc Habscheid said after leading his team to it’s first conference final since 2005. “There’s no way we should have lost this game.”

“I’m really happy for the city, the organization, but mostly those kids over there.”

Parker Kelly, Sean Montgomery and Aliaksei Protas scored for the Raiders, who will face the Edmonton Oil Kings in the Eastern Conference Final after the Oil Kings swept the Calgary Hitmen 4-0.

“We’re all a little bagged, and I think that’s a sign of winning,” Raiders captain Brayden Pachal said. “We’re excited and we’re looking forward to Edmonton.”

It was a bitter end to the season for the three over-aged players on Saskatoon. While many players will return to the Blades next season, Davidson, Max Gerlach and Brandon Schuldhaus played their final WHL game and will now ponder their futures.

“I think we’re pretty proud of the fight we put up,” Schuldhaus said. “For our group, having a lot of guys returning, this experience this year will be really valuable for them.”

How it happened

Parker Kelly started the scoring after gathering a giveaway by Blades captain Chase Wouters at centre ice and snapping a shot past goalie Nolan Maier.

Wouters would redeem himself 6:17 later on the power play by setting a screen in front of Raiders goaltender Ian Scott as Ryan Hughes fired a shot from distance.

The second period saw the Raiders build a two-goal lead with goals from Dante Hannoun and Aliaksei Protas 3:10 apart. Hannoun potted home a rebound that went off the post, while Protas waited for Maier to move past his net on a cross-ice pass.

Hughes would keep the Blades in the game with another power play shot from distance that mimicked his first goal.

Prince Albert started the third period with two goals in the first 5:27.

Hannoun scored his second of the night on a tap-in by capitalizing on a shorthanded Blades unit after a beleaguered Nolan Kneen blocked a shot and was limping out of position.

Montgomerie would net his sixth goal of the series on the power play to give the Raiders their first three-goal lead of the game. Saskatoon pushed Prince Albert for the rest of the game, but could only manage a Tristen Robins deflection goal before Dante Hannoun converted his hat-trick goal on an empty net to end the game.

Quick Hits

The Raiders won every game in the series when Montgomerie scored.

Sunday’s result was the first road win for either team the entire series, snapping the Blades 13-game winning streak on home ice.

Gary Haden, one of six 1999-born players on next season’s roster, had just two points in the playoffs and was demoted to the fourth line in the season finale after a 31-goal and 67-point regular season.