Despite scoring three unanswered goals, the Lloydminster Bobcats were not quite able to dig themselves out of a large hole dug during the first thirty minutes of Tuesday night’s game in Whitecourt.
Visiting the Wolverines for the second time this season, the Bobcats fell 5-3 to the home team after nearly erasing a 4-0 deficit.
On a power-play opportunity early in the first period, the Wolverines broke the ice with an Easton Haygarth goal. The local product jammed a puck up and over the shoulder of Bobcat’s starting goalie Justin Vertesi.
Then with under a minute to play in the opening frame Whitecourt doubled their lead on a Bjorn Robinson goal.
During the first half of the second period it was more of the same.
Haygarth scored his second goal of the game, while Adam Sandstrom added another tally for Whitecourt to give them a 4-0 advantage. However, the Sandstrom goal seemed to serve as a wake-up call for Lloydminster.
With just under eight minutes to play in the middle period, Hunter Lamb put the Cats on the board as he put home a beautiful feed from Logan Bromhead.
Then Lamb added his second of the night with just 22 seconds remaining in the period on a 5-on-3 power-play when he bounced the puck of a Whitecourt skate and in.
As the man-advantage continued into the start of the third period, the Bobcats pulled within one.
Mason Waite sent a long point shot towards the goal which Ty Mosimann deflected home to make it 4-3.
Despite the pressure in both ends, Lloydminster was unable to complete the comeback as Haygarth secured his first career hat-trick scoring an empty-net goal with only .6 seconds remaining.
Whitecourt outshot Lloydminster 39-21 in the game, with most of that advantage taking place in the first period when they outshot the Cats 19-3.
The Bobcats finished the game 2 for 4 on the power-play, while the Wolverines went 1 for 4.
The Cats will now wrap up a mini two-game mid-week road trip with a Wednesday night contest in Grande Prairie. Puck drop between the Cats and Storm is scheduled for 7:30 from Revolution Place.