Despite an effort their head coach wasn’t too happy about, the Moose Jaw Generals were still able to pick up four points in a home-and-home series with the Notre Dame Hounds over the weekend.

Moose Jaw beat the Hounds 3-2 on Sunday at Mosaic Place to finish off the weekend, but head coach Ray Wareham says there was just no compete from his team, despite the 3-2 win, “If you go back and look at the video, we had to be in the 70 turnover range,  that’s just unbelievable how you can turn the puck over that many times.”

It was a sloppy game at Mosaic Place on Sunday with the two teams skating to a scoreless first period before Dayton Picard got Moose Jaw on the board with his 19th of the season just 1:18 into the second.  Notre Dame responded not long after though with Jacob Cardiff beat Grant Naherniak to make it 1-1.

Moose Jaw scored quickly to open the third period as well, with Colton Schick getting his 19th just 28 seconds into the final frame.  Dylan Johner scored what went on to be the game winner just past the midway point of the period on the power play.  Tim McGauley pulled the Hounds within one a little later, but they couldn’t find the equalizer.

Naherniak stopped 17 shots to pick up the win, while Alexi Thibaudeau stopped 18-of-21 Moose Jaw shots.

The Generals finished one-for-seven on the power play and four-for-five on the penalty kill.

Wareham says his team couldn’t really get any sustained pressure in the game, but are happy to escape with the win, “The only time we ever had the puck down low in their end was when we were on the power play and then defensively we would just throw it around the wall and our wingers couldn’t get pucks out.  Just too soft.

“When you’re winning and you play like that it’s tough to get the message through.  We saw it after that Battleford weekend and it haunted us a bit and we lost three in a row when we played those tougher teams and we’re just no where near good enough today if we want to compete March 1st.”

With the four points this weekend, Moose Jaw has created a bit of breathing room on fourth place in the Sask Midget AAA Hockey League standings.  They sit at 22-10-1-2 on the year with 47 points, four up on Prince Albert and Tisdale.

The Generals get Monday off and then head out to Wilcox on Tuesday for a meeting with the Notre Dame Argos.  Puck drops at 8:00pm.