A good fight back from the Moose Jaw Chiefs came up just short on Wednesday night at Mosaic Place.

The Chiefs fell 8-6 to the Regina Heat in a big game in the Prairie Gold Lacrosse League’s senior division.

With the win, the Heat moved into sole possession of second place with a 6-1 record, while the Chiefs had their three-game winning streak snapped and dropped to 5-2 on the year.

After rolling to some easy wins over the lower teams in the league, the Chiefs were happy with the hard fought game against the Heat, but know there’s areas to improve on after the loss.

“You lose the game, but at least you’re playing a competitive hard fought game,” said Assistant Captain Jeff Kitts, who had an assist in the loss. “We were playing some of the newer teams in the league for a couple of weeks and you sit back and it bits you in these games.”

Moose Jaw trailed 4-2 after one and 5-3 after two. Kitts said it comes down to being more disciplined early and taking advantage of their chances.

“We need to work on our emotional control, we kind of lost it in the first period, the game was pretty physical and I don’t think we reacted as well as we needed to, so a good learning piece there because as the season goes on we play (Regina) again and (the Brewers) again and it’s going to be games like that until the end,” said Kitts.

The Chiefs battled back to tie the game early in the third with two goals in the first 4:50 of the final frame and would take a 6-5 lead just 58 second later on Frank Davalos’ second of the game, but it was short lived as the Heat tied things back up two minutes later.

As the third went on, Moose Jaw had their chances, but couldn’t finish, leaving the door open for the Heat to take the win with two goals in the final six minutes.

“In the third period, we went back on the short change, so we were able to get guys out there in a hurry and it opens up the offensive transition a bit,” said Kitts. “A couple of posts and some big saves, if we can get some of those to go in, it’s a different story.

“Every guy wanted to contribute to the team, you’re down by one and here’s the opportunity, and they were really aggressive, so right as we were trying to shoot, they’re getting right on the hands and things like that, but we were trying a bit too much instead of getting the open look.”

Davalos and Chris Fall had two goals each in the loss for Moose Jaw, while Todd Doepker finished with a goal and three points. Tanner Kittler had the other goal for the Chiefs and Carter Davis chipped in with two assists.

Regina picked up two goals each from Dylan Lefebure and Adam Stewart in the win.

The top of the division remains tight with the Chiefs, Heat and Saskatoon Brewers separated by just four points with Saskatoon leading at 7-0. Kitts is confident that they can close that gap as the season progresses.

“It’s going to come down to burying your chances, some of those posts that maybe go instead of off the post, so we’ll see what happens as the season moves on,” he said.

The Chiefs are off now until next Thursday when they host the Saskatoon Steelers.