Saskatoon Blades swept in Game 4 loss, Prince Albert Raiders advance to third round

There was no late miracle comeback for the Saskatoon Blades on Wednesday night, as the Prince Albert Raiders came out on top of the Highway 11 rivalry to advance in the Western Hockey League playoffs.

Prince Albert is off to the WHL’s Eastern Conference final series for the first time since 2019, as they defeated the Blades 5-3 in Game 4 of their second round series to complete the sweep at SaskTel Centre.

A bit of revenge for the Raiders after losing in five games to the Blades in the opening round of playoffs in their last post-season meeting in 2024.

“It was nice to get that one and do it in four (games),” said Raiders captain Justice Christensen. “I definitely didn’t forget about that (loss) in 2024, I had that in the back on my mind the whole time. It was nice to get it done.”

The Blades’ season drew to a close with the Game 4 loss, eliminated from WHL playoffs after a run to the second round, which included a Game 7 overtime victory against the Edmonton Oil Kings.

Following the final buzzer, Blades captain Tyler Parr led his team down the handshake line with a broken heart seeing the end to his five years in the WHL.

“It sucks losing to the Raiders, but I’m super proud of this group over the year,” Parr said. “I’m super proud of the effort against Edmonton, super proud of the effort in this series. We fought right to the end.”

Wednesday’s loss marked the final junior game for Blades veterans Parr and Rowan Calvert, graduating after five years in Saskatoon.

“Just kind of taking it all in (post-game),” Parr said. “Looking around at all the fans, looking at my mom. Probably my last time stepping off the ice there, so it was pretty emotional. But yeah, super grateful for my five years here.”

Following the handshakes, Parr shared a moment with Christensen following half a decade of battles between the two East Division captains.

While Parr said they don’t know each other well off the ice, he added it was a meaningful final chapter to close off this year’s edition of the Saskatoon-Prince Albert rivalry.

“We’ve had a lot of battles and there’s a lot of respect there,” Parr said.

“He’s a warrior, he’s a great hockey player, we’ve fought three times I think. Just great battles, but it’s a guy I could sit down and have a beer with.”

Prince Albert opened the scoring 1:08 into the game with Vancouver Canucks top prospect Braeden Cootes banking the puck off Evan Gardner from a sharp angle for the early 1-0 goal.

Maddix McCagherty added to the hot start for the visiting Raiders less than four minutes later, redirecting a Brock Cripps shot with his skate while parked in front of the Saskatoon net.

Prince Albert quickly extended that lead to 3-0 as defender Matyas Man walked into the slot and fired home his second goal of the playoffs, which forced Blades head coach Dan DaSilva to use his timeout 6:12 into the game.

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Saskatoon’s spiral finally ended on their next shot, with David Lewandowski’s shot towards Michal Orsulak being deflected off a Raiders skate and into the net to get the Blades on the board.

Lewandowski’s marker snapped a goalless drought for the Blades of nearly 135 straight minutes dating back to Game 1 of the series last Friday.

Any Saskatoon momentum was halted with 2:57 left before the intermission, with Prince Albert making it a 4-1 game off a shot from top NHL Draft prospect Daxon Rudolph.

His shot trickled through Gardner towards the post, however in an attempt to clear the crease, Blades defenceman Jordan Martin put the puck into his own net.

Saskatoon forward Hunter Laing gave the home side a flicker of life midway through the second period, as he hopped on a loose puck in the Raiders’ crease for his fourth goal of the playoffs to cut the deficit to 4-2.

Before the second period buzzer sounded, the Blades pulled within a single goal on the power play 4-3 from a wrist shot by Parr for what ended up as the final goal of his junior career.

Holding onto their slimmest lead of the night, the Raiders added some needed insurance with a backbreaking snipe off the rush by Max Heise for his first goal of the post-season to restore Prince Albert’s two-goal lead.

“That goal was huge to kind of kill their momentum and put it back on our side,” Rudolph said.

“We didn’t lose confidence at all there when they got the third one on the board, we knew it was going to be tight and going to be hard. But when Heise buried that one, it definitely gave us a little bit of breathing room.”

According to Raiders head coach Ryan McDonald, Wednesday’s game was the tightest of the series and was impressed how his team handled a Saskatoon squad which played with more and more desperation.

“The Blades pushed hard,” McDonald said.

“That’s a real scrappy team over there, they didn’t go away and kept pushing us. They got the game close and we had to buckle down and get back to our game. I give our guys a lot of credit getting to that third period and really locking things down.”

Saskatoon head coach Dan DaSilva credited his team for rising above expectations all season long, citing their resiliency and belief in their play from puck drop in September.

Packing up their bags one final time this season, he said it’s a difficult loss given how much determination they played with to close out the series.

“They played with so much pride the last 40 minutes,” DaSilva said. “They weren’t going to say die and I thought we had our best period of the series in the second period there. It was our best game of the series and still came up short.”

The Raiders now advance to face the reigning WHL champion Medicine Hat Tigers in the Eastern Conference final, after they defeated the Calgary Hitmen in four games.