Haun Earns Start In Goal For Chiefs Against Moose Jaw
David Haun gets the start in goal tonight when the Spokane Chiefs take on coach Mike Babcock’s first Western Hockey League team, the Moose Jaw Warriors.
Haun earned the start with the better game last weekend, Babcock said Tuesday. He beat the Edmonton Ice 5-3 the night after the Chiefs with Miller in net lost to the No. 1-ranked Portland Winter Hawks 5-2.
Moose Jaw, one of the enigmas of the WHL - up one night, down the next - would make the playoffs as the eighth and final team out of the combined Central and East divisions if the season ended today.
Goaltender Donavan Nunweiler and the Warriors were tough in the playoffs a year ago when they upset the Brandon Wheat Kings in the first round in six games.
The Warriors have 11 players back including Nunweiler, but have played well only in spurts. They were unbeaten in six games after Christmas, then went on a five-game winless skid.
They tend to play to their level of competition. The Warriors opened this trip tying a struggling Medicine Hat team, then beat a good Lethbridge club Sunday 4-3.
Coach Al Tuer replaced Babcock as Warriors coach and general manager after the ‘93 season. Defenseman Chris Twerdun is the last remnant of Babcock’s two-year stint there. Twerdun was placed on the club’s 50-man protected list by Babcock but didn’t play for the coach.
The Chiefs expect to have defenseman Kyle Rossiter back from Tuesday night’s Top Prospects game in Toronto.
That’s an important development since they’re short a D-man with Brad Ference getting some time at home in Calgary. Chiefs GM Tim Speltz said Ference hasn’t had any extended down time since the World Junior Tournament.
Around the WHL…
Ex-Chief John Cirjak, who returns to the Arena on Feb. 21 with the Regina Pats, had a pair of third-period insurance goals in the Pats’ important 4-1 home-ice win over the Swift Current Broncos Saturday night…Former Chiefs right wing Mike Haley is playing for ex-Spokane assistant coach Brett Cox in Bonnyville, Alberta, for the Junior A club there. Haley joined the Pontiacs just after Christmas….One night after chasing Spokane goaltender Aren Miller here Friday night, the Portland Winter Hawks drove Seattle Thunderbirds netminder Cody Rudkowsky to an even earlier exit. At least Miller made it to the third period. Rudkowsky was lifted at 7:15 of the second in Seattle’s Saturday night loss to the streaking Winter Hawks. Portland has won 14 straight and is 24-1-1 in its last 26 games. Oh yeah, the Hawks humbled the T-Birds with their backup goaltender Jason Labarbera, in net.
Ex-Chiefs checks
Kevin Sawyer ranks third in the International Hockey League in penalty minutes. Sawyer, who played the last of his three seasons here in ‘94-95, is also No. 3 in the league in major penalties with 22….The Las Vegas Thunder of the I League traded former Chiefs star Darcy Loewen to the Utah Grizzlies for ex-Kelowna Rockets center Tyler Prosofsky. Loewen, 29, who played four seasons in Spokane in the 1980s, earns a base salary in the neighborhood of $85,000 as one of the league’s willing fighters. Prosofsky, a rookie, and Loewen traded punches last week before they traded uniforms. Loewen, who played for Utah coach Butch Goring in Spokane, leaves Las Vegas as the club’s leader in career penalty minutes….Former Chiefs star Tony Horacek has retired and taken an office job with the IHL Utah Grizzlies.
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