The Yorkton Harvest must be wondering what they can do to turn their season around.
The Midget AAA club has lost three straight games. A 1-0 overtime loss to the Regina Pat Canadians at home on Wednesday was followed up with a pair of losses to the Saskatoon Contacts, 4-2 on Saturday and 4-3 on Sunday.
The trio of losses leaves the Harvest in eighth place with 31 points and a record of 12-17-4-3, now eight points behind the Contacts (17-15-2-3) and just seven points up on the Saskatoon Blazers (9-23-5-1) for the eighth and final SMAAAHL playoff spot.
Weekend in Saskatoon
It was a weekend that the Harvest would like to forget.
The Yorkton club opened up a two goal lead in both games, only to have the Contacts come storming back to steal victory from the jaws of defeat in the third period of each game.
In the first game, on Saturday, the Harvest took a 2-0 lead on second period goals by Turner Ottenbreit and Damian Bentz, their ninth and fifth respectively, before the Contacts offence came alive with four unanswered goals in the third period to shock the Harvest 4-2.
Scoring for the Contacts in the third were Jaden Baier with two and Evan Fiala and Kole Lind with one each.
Carson Bogdan shouldered the loss for the Harvest, stopping 17 of 21 shots while Declan Hobbs picked up the win for the Contacts making 22 of a possible 24 saves.
The Sunday game was similar to the Saturday one in that the Harvest once again jumped out to a two goal lead.
Korwin Shewchuk put his seventh of the season past Contacts netminder Brock Hamm with 17:52 left in the opening frame.
Tyler Kreklewich made it 2-0 Harvest just 40 seconds later with his 11th of the season, but the Contacts would get back to within one before the end of the period when Zachary Nedelec tucked the puck past Bogdan to make it 2-1.
The only goal of the middle period came off the stick of Saskatoon's Kole Lind, who beat Bogdan on the powerplay to make it 2-2 after two periods of play.
Yorkton's powerplay would answer back early in the third period. Drayson Skulmoski would give the visitors their second lead of the game, this time at 3-2, with his second of the season.
Unfortunately for the Harvest, Contacts rookie Jimmy Lambert drew his team even with 12:54 remaining in the game.
Erik Climenhaga gave the Contacts a 4-3 lead with his 11th of the season via the powerplay and Hamm held the fort long enough for the Contacts to pull out another come-from-behind win over the Yorkton Harvest.
Carson Bogdan picked up the loss, is second in as many nights, despite turning aside 38 of 42 shots.
Hamm picked up the win in the Contacts net stopping 21 of 24 shots.
Wednesday night
If the Harvest didn't have bad luck then they'd have no luck at all.
Wednesday's game against the Regina Pat Canadians saw no one score in regulation, meaning overtime was needed to decide the outcome.
Forty-seven seconds of overtime was all that was needed for Pat Canadians' star forward Jayden Halbgewachs to end the game. Halbgewachs spoiled the great effort by Bogdan, beating the Harvest netminder for the game winning, and lone, goal.
Bogdan picked up the hard luck loss for the Harvest while stopping 31 of 32 shots. Logan Flodell registered the shutout win in the Regina net stopping all 21 shots fired his way.
Harvest head coach Dan Cross did not mix words when asked how he and his team feel about the results of their last few games. "We're a little bit disappointed and frustrated with the outcome of the whole weekend," said Cross in a phone interview Monday afternoon. "We're having trouble scoring goals and we're taking untimely penalties. We ended up down two men in both games against Saskatoon at crucial times and they scored both times and that seemed to be the momentum swing in both games."
Despite the losses, however, Cross still feels his team can make some noise come playoff time. They just have to sit back, relax and reset their mindset. "Now we need to change our focus and make sure we solidify our eighth position and make the playoffs," mentioned Cross, continuing, "We still have some work to do, but I am confident we can do it."
Next action
The next game for the Yorkton Harvest will be this Sunday, February ninth when they host the Regina Pat Canadians once again. Game time is set for 2:00p.m. at the Farrell Agencies Arena.
