Friday at Mosaic Place, the Moose Jaw Warriors battled the Calgary Hitmen for 60 minutes but just came up short, falling 4-2.

The Warriors got off to a great start as they used their speed to attack the Calgary zone. Their fore-check created turnovers and extra attack time, and defensively, they used their speed to come back and limit Calgary’s chances which led to an early 10-1 Moose Jaw advantage on the shot clock.

However, Calgary weathered the Warriors storm and capitalized on two power-plays, they picked up goals from Riley Stotts and Josh Prokop to take a 2-0 lead.

After a fast action-packed first period, the second period was tight and physical as both teams looked to limit the quality scoring chances.

At 11:53 and with a delayed penalty coming to Calgary, Tate Popple dug the puck away from the Hitmen along their right wall. Popple swung the puck to the blueline for Braden Miller who let a hard shot go into traffic that found the back of the net, his first WHL goal got the Warriors on the board.

Approaching the six-minute mark of the third period, the Warriors goaltender went to play the puck behind the Moose Jaw net. Calgary Captain Mark Kastelic came in hard on the fore-check, stole the puck, and moved it to the left side the net where Jonas Peterek knocked in Calgary’s third goal.

Down by two late, the Warriors pulled their goalie inside the final three minutes of regulation. Daemon Hunt came off the blue line and put a shot towards the Calgary net, Owen Hardy was on top of the crease and deflected in his sixth of the season to pull the Warriors to within one.

The Warriors pulled their goaltender again with under ninety seconds left in the game but only this time it backfired as Carson Focht scored an empty-net marker to give the Hitmen the win.

Bailey Brkin made 22 saves in the loss while Brayden Peters made 20 saves for the win.

Moose Jaw was 0-for-3 on the power-play and 1-for-3 on the penalty kill.

The Warriors have Saturday off, coming up on Sunday they will head up to Saskatoon for their first meeting of the season against the Blades.

Catch all the action on Country 100 starting with the PreGame Show at 1:40 pm.