The Fort McMurray Oil Barons head into the 2019 Christmas break with a two-game split on the road, but put forward one of the best team efforts of the season. The Barons won 3-0 in Camrose against the Kodiaks on Tuesday before falling 5-2 to the Sherwood Park Crusaders Wednesday night. Despite the tough loss to the division-leading Crusaders, the Barons are trending upward as they hit the break, and are playing some of their best hockey of the season.
The MOB started the road trip with one of their best performances of 2019 in Camrose. They found themselves down a player early as Breydon Berthold received a game misconduct for kneeing at 6:42 of the first period. The MOB will kill off the ensuing 5-minute major, along with two other minor penalties, one rout to a scoreless period against the Kodiaks. The Barons would open the scoring in the second period with a powerplay marker from Michael Hodge. Ty Budai would add another powerplay goal in the third, and Hodge would score his second of the game minutes after. Hodge extended his point streak to 8 games. Evan Fradette stopped all 37 shots he faced, notching his second shutout of the season. It was Fradette’s first game back after a call-up stint in the WHL. The MOB successfully killed off all five penalties, the second game in a row where their penalty kill was 100%
The Barons then traveled to Sherwood Park for a date with the Viterra North-leading Sherwood Park Crusaders. The Crusaders would pounce on the MOB early, potting three goals within the first five minutes, and looked to run away with the game. William Zapernick opened the scoring, followed by a goal off of a costly turnover in the Barons zone by Blake Sydlowski, and then a second Zapernick goal. The Barons settled things down in the second, however, and cut into the Crusaders lead with a powerplay goal by Michael Hodge, and a breakaway goal by Max Struss. The powerplay goal by Hodge was his 20th of the season and continued his excellent play of late. He heads to the Christmas break on a nine-game point streak. For Struss, it was his second goal of the season and came in unexpected fashion. One of the linesmen accidentally got in the way of a Crusader defenseman, allowing Struss to get in alone on a breakaway, and he beat Sherwood Park goaltender Carter Gylander clean to bring the MOB within one. A parade to the penalty box ultimately cost the Oil Barons in the third, as Arjun Atwal and Connor Hart would score a powerplay goal each midway through the period. The MOB would fall 5-2 in a hard-fought game against a highly skilled Crusaders team.
The Barons head into the break with a 14-21-2 record, good for 30 points and 5th spot in the North; they are just one point up on both Drayton Valley and Grande Prairie, however, with the Storm playing another three games before they head to the Christmas break. The MOB will close out 2019 with two games at the Casman Centre – they host Drayton Valley in two extremely important games on December 28 and 29. You can tune in to all the action on Country 93.3
