Spokane Chiefs waste two-goal lead in third, lose to Moose Jaw in overtime 5-4

The Spokane Chiefs earned their most impressive win of the season on Friday, beating Western Conference leaders Everett 4-0 on the road.

They followed that effort with another solid performance on Saturday at home, dismantling an Eastern Conference team that had lost three of its last four at the end of a six-game road trip through the West – at least though the first 50 minutes.

But the final 10 minutes – plus 37 seconds in overtime – told a different story. And time is running short for the Chiefs to recover from missed opportunities. 

Gage Nagel scored less than a minute into overtime and the visiting Moose Jaw Warriors escaped with a 5-4 win over the Chiefs before a stunned crowd of 7,859 at the Arena on Saturday. The Chiefs blew a two-goal third period lead – allowing a three-goal barrage over 2 minutes, 15 seconds. 

Spokane outshot its visitor 45-25 and held a 36-24 advantage on faceoffs.

“You know what? It’s a lesson learned,” Chiefs coach Brad Lauer said. “I mean, it’s too bad we’re still learning these things this late. I mean, give (Moose Jaw) credit. They they survived. … We let them hang around.”

The Chiefs fell to ninth in the Western Conference, one point behind Victoria for the final playoff spot with 26 games left in the regular season. 

“We should be worried (about the playoffs), cause we’re not in them right now,” Lauer said. “If we’re not scared about not making the playoffs then something is wrong. This game – you can’t take it for granted. Anybody can beat anyone any given night. If you’re not prepared to play your game and not ready night in and night out it’s gonna be too late. There’s got to be some urgency. We need to be playing playoff hockey right now.”

The Chiefs led 3-1 midway through the third period. But at the 10-minute mark, Moose Jaw’s Pavel McKenzie knocked in a loose puck after Chiefs goalie Linus Vieillard stopped a 2-on-1 rush but left the rebound at the top of the crease.

It gave the tired visitors hope.

Chiefs forward Assanali Sarkenov was called for slashing 32 seconds later, and the Warriors took full advantage when Landen McFadden’s one-timer from the right wing circle tied it at 11:01 of the third.

Moose Jaw scored its third goal in rapid succession when Mathieu Lajoie tipped a McFadden pass past Vieillard for his eighth of the season, leaving the Chiefs to wonder how their fortunes had turned around so fast.

“We talked about some things (at second intermission) we needed to do in the third period, and I thought we didn’t do them. I thought we got away from playing the team game,” Lauer said. “You can’t play like that. We’re a team that can’t play like that. You know, we’re not that that (high-scoring) team anymore. We’ve got to play the right way, do the things that we need to do as a team and play as five and, you know, I thought we got off off script a little bit.”

The Chiefs caught a late break when Moose Jaw’s Ethan Semeniuk was called for hooking with 1:42 left in regulation. Once the Chiefs gained the offensive zone, Lauer pulled Vieillard for an extra skater and the Chiefs cashed in, with Rhett Sather’s shot from the point getting though a maze of bodies for his eighth of the year at 18:55 of the third.

But the tying goal only extended the inevitable disappointment, as early in OT Nagel came in on a 2-on-1 with Aiden Ziprick but kept it himself, beating Vieillard short side for his seventh goal of the season. 

“This group has to understand how we have to win hockey games,” Lauer said. “We can’t play on our own, we can’t go individual, we can’t be on our own page and think we’re going to win hockey games.”

The Chiefs (21-20-1-0) dominated play early, outshooting Moose Jaw 9-2 over the first 10 minutes of the game. They seized the lead at 10:04 of the period when Tristan Buckley, who had just jumped on the ice on a change, knocked in a long rebound of a Nathan Mayes shot for his fifth goal of the season.

They made it 2-0 a few minutes later. The Chiefs won a puck along the left wing boards and Brody Gillespie skated to the slot and passed to Sam Oremba, who put a backhander past Moose Jaw goalie Chase Wutzke for his 16th goal of the season.

But Moose Jaw (17-27-3-1) scored while the announcer was reading Oremba’s goal, with Connor Schmidt scoring his 14th of the season to halve the Warriors’ deficit.

Recently acquired defenseman Marek Howell single-handedly made it 3-1 6:23 into the second period, gathering a turnover at the Moose Jaw blue line, skating down the slot and sending a wrister high glove side past Wutzke for his fifth goal of the season and first in a Chiefs uniform.

Spokane limited its visitor to six shots in the second period and seemed poised for a feel-good win.

“If we play the right way, we can dominate in this league,” Lauer said. “But if we’re going to get off script and do our own thing at times, this is what we’re going to have. And you know, at some point you’d like to hope that you start learning these things.”

Late start: The game, scheduled for 6:05 p.m., started 40 minutes late after a plate of glass behind the west goal broke during warmups and an apparatus used to remove the broken glass got stuck on the ice.