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Wranglers grabbed five of six points

Flu bug couldn’t defeat local lads who ‘toughed in out’
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Wranglers goalie Clay Stevenson was a busy man in the net last weekend as he played in three games and won two. Against Osoyoos

By Ken Alexander

Despite having half a dozen players battling a flu bug and being very nauseous, the 100 Mile House Wranglers sucked it up and grabbed five out of six possible points last weekend.

"They were throwing up during the pre-game run and warm-up; they toughed it out and I think we're on the back end of it. It's on the back end for some but you don't know about the other guys," says head coach and general manager Dale "Duner" Hladun.

He notes Clay Stevenson had to play all three games because new goalie Jakob Severson was too sick to play.

With the hunt the Wranglers are in for another divisional title, Duner says five points was pretty good, but six points would have helped more.

The Wranglers shut out the Eagles 4-0 in Sicamous on Jan. 6.

They came home to host the Osoyoos Coyotes and had to settle for one point in a 6-5 overtime loss on Jan. 7.

Then down 1-0 going into the third against the Storm in Kamloops, the Wranglers stormed back with three unanswered goals for the 3-1 victory.

Hampered by the flu bug the way they were, Duner says the lads coming back from a 5-2 deficit in the third period against Osoyoos with three minutes left on the clock was "pretty impressive."

"I thought we were playing Osoyoos pretty strong head-to-head and then we got into a funk and started running around in the D zone, and I was a little disappointed with the effort of a few guys."

However, Duner says he really likes the way Frazer Dodd, Ryan Friesen and Riley Coish turned it up a notch, and he adds this trio was "huge" for the team all weekend.

"Riley made everybody he played with better. He worked so hard on the puck and elevated his play ... he was the hungry dog on a bone all weekend."

Duner notes that Coish, team captain Stephen Egan and Kolby Page were great on the penalty kill all weekend.

"Page, Egan and Coish and the other penalty killers were a high percentage of the reason we did well this weekend.

"The team is going in the right direction because it's similar to the way it was going last year. The Wrangler way started to show up where we got a little adversity and it wasn't going our way but we clawed our way back and managed to win."

Duner says they are adding 20-year-old Jaydon Gilding who patrolled the blue line for last year's championship team.

The Wranglers host the Kelowna Chiefs on Saturday (Jan. 14) with the puck dropping at 7 p.m. The team will be without Duner, Stevenson, Dodd and Brevin Gervais who will be participating in the KIJHL Prospects Game in Kelowna.