The Reminder is making its archives back to 2003 available on our website. Please note that, due to technical limitations, archive articles are presented without the usual formatting.
An impressive crowd of 720 showed up for an unimpressive penalty-filled performance by the Flin Flon Bombers, who were blanked 4-0 by the LaRonge Ice Wolves at the Whitney Forum, Thursday evening. If it weren't for the performances of Travis Crickard, who allowed three goals, and Calvin Bartel one goal, things could have been worse as the team was out shot 39-19. "I thought both guys played fairly well," said Bombers coach-GM Doug Stokes. "I thought Travis on the one goal was left to fend for it. It was not one, not two, but three opportunities before it went in the net and again because of the indecision of the defence. Should I hit a guy? Should I knock him down? Can I do that? Can I not? We left guys standing there. See 'Penalties' P.# Con't from P.# "When you consider that we did have three veteran guys dressed, they have to be better," Stokes explained. "The refreshing thing to me as a coach is that we know that they can be better. It's just not a very good game and not a very good start for them and they're going to have to pull up their performance significantly from this point." Prior to the game Stokes said that he wanted to see passion and intensity from his team. After taking 14 penalties, he believed that proved challenging. "When you take 25 minor penalties (both teams combined), which totals 50 minutes in a 60 minute game, it's pretty tough and difficult to have any passion or intensity to your game," he explained. "I know there's an adjustment period to the new rules to be abided by, but I thought we were undisciplined in a lot of areas too. We just took some dumb penalties." Veteran defenceman David Holinaty echoed Stokes' sentiments and said it affected the Bombers' momentum. "We were always in our own end because we were always shorthanded," Holinaty explained. "When you're shorthanded like that we're in pressure and sucked into taking more and more penalties. It's very disappointing." The Bombers had one day to work on their problems as they faced the Swan Valley Stampeders at home last Saturday.
