By Nathan Kanter

Combines look to recover from slow start

Dec 9, 2016 | 1:00 PM

The start to the season for the Meota Combines of the SPHL has not been what they expected.

In each of the pasts two seasons, they have only suffered three regulation losses all year. Right now, they have already lost three times, and sit at 1-3 after four games.

“Definitely not what we wanted but it’s a long season,” Combines forward and manager Aaron Cadrin said. “There’s definitely room for improvement and we know it’s going to get better from here.”

Brett Miller, the Combines leading scorer for the past three seasons, is also out for the entire season, which has made things more difficult.

Miller has amassed 129 points in just 53 games over those three years and led the league in scoring in 2013-14 with 49 points.

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“That’s going to be tough to replace but we’ve got a good enough team and enough depth that once everyone starts showing up we should be able to pull together and start pulling off some wins,” Cadrin said. “It’s getting better and better each game. We definitely were hoping for two wins last weekend against Glaslyn and Spiritwood but we had a bad start against Glaslyn and we were kind of short guys and we never really recovered from there.”

Meota did score 11 goals in their win over Spiritwood last Saturday, and they’ll play them again on Friday, this time on the road.

“We finally had three full lines and we were able to roll lines and get some combinations together that were working,” Cadrin said. “We were playing a lot of the other games with six and seven and eight forwards so that was kind of tough for chemistry with everyone but things clicked right from puck drop on Saturday.

“Hopefully that’s a sign of things to come moving forward.”

Meanwhile, the Battlefords Beaver Blues are 3-2 to start their SPHL campaign.

Both of their losses were close games, a 7-5 loss to Shellbrook and a 7-6 defeat to Hafford.

“The two losses we had were against some really tough teams,” Beaver Blues manager Kevin Russel said. “The defending champions Shellbrook, we lost to them in their barn and … Hafford [has] got a really tough team as well.”

The Beaver Blues lead the league with 36 goals for.

Russel said forward depth has been one reason why.

“Definitely our top three lines have been good,” he said. “Our first two lines are pretty solid and then our third line is scoring and moving the puck really well.”

The Beaver Blues are in Turtleford on Saturday for a date with the Glaslyn North Stars. Glaslyn has played just three games so far this season and is 2-1.

“Glaslyn’s got a really different team this year – they’ve added a couple new guys and their goalie has been playing really well,” Russel said. “I expect a pretty tough game against them.”

Around the league

The defending champion Shellbrook Silvertips are 4-0 this year. They host the Radisson Wheatkings Friday at 8:30 p.m.

Hafford is the only other undefeated team, at 3-0. They are off this weekend.

Sask. West Hockey League

It’s a much busier schedule in the SWHL this weekend, with three games on Friday and three on Saturday.

The Wilkie Outlaws, the only undefeated team at 4-0, will face off twice, on Friday in Eatonia against the Huskies and on Saturday in Kindersley against the Red Lions.

The second place Luseland/Dodsland Mallards host the Biggar Nationals on Friday and the Macklin Mohawks on Saturday.

Meanwhile, Kindersley hosts Kerrobert on Friday while the Huskies are home to the Biggar Nationals on Saturday.

Nathan Kanter is battlefordsNOW’s sports reporter and voice of the Battlefords North Stars. He can be reached at Nathan.kanter@jpbg.ca or tweet him @NathanKanter11