OKOTOKS, AB (March 3, 2023) — In their final home game of the regular season, the Okotoks Oilers dropped a 5-1 decision to the visiting Drumheller Dragons, putting the team at risk of falling behind the Dragons in the AJHL South standing in the season finale tomorrow night in Drumheller.
After a Wil Christian rebound goal put the visitors up early, Ethan Rowland (Calgary, AB) tied it on a sharp angle shot from the left side of the Drumheller net on the power play. After 1, it was tied 1-1 and Okotoks had held Drumheller to just five shots.
But the Dragons dominated and pulled away in the second. First, Ty Daneault scored the game-winner, jamming his stick into the pad of Parker Sawka (Cochrane, AB), which the puck was underneath. But the whistle didn’t go, and Sawka’s pad was forced back far enough to re-dislodge the puck, which slid into the net. On the very next shift, Kai Matthew made it 3-1 on a backdoor one-timer from the left circle, while Ty Whitford capped off the second period scoring on a shorthanded goal with a net-front one-timer set up by Sam Simard from the end wall.
The only goal in the third was a Simard empty netter to notch the 5-1 final score.