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Wranglers Series Preview: A desert duel against the Roadrunners
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Photo credit: Angela Burger/Calgary Wranglers
Paige Siewert
Nov 22, 2024, 14:00 ESTUpdated: Nov 22, 2024, 00:43 EST
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The Calgary Wranglers and Tucson Roadrunners face each other for the first time this season in a weekend battle in the desert. The Utah Hockey Club’s affiliate is down at eighth in the Pacific standings but have played the least amount of games in the division so far. Their winning record is teetering below .500 with a 6-7-0-0 record on the season. Calgary at the top of the division and the league go into this series as the favourites but both are coming off of wins to help drive some momentum into the weekend.

Projected lineups

Calgary
Jakob Pelletier – Rory Kerins – Dryden Hunt
William Stromgren – Sam Morton – Walker Duehr
Sam Honzek – Clark Bishop – Martin Frk
Parker Bell – David Silye – Lucas Ciona 
Artem Grushnikov – Ilya Solovyov 
Jarred Tinordi – Jeremie Poirier
Yan Kuznetsov – Hunter Brzustewicz
Devin Cooley
Waltteri Ignatjew
Tucson 
Forwards: Egor Sokolov, Ryan McGregor, Milos Kelemen, Ben McCartney, Travis Barron, Austin Poganski, Curtis Douglas, Andrew Agozzino, Hunter Drew, Aku Raty, Cameron Hebig, Julian Lutz, Miko Matikka, Kailer Yamamoto, Sam Lipkin, Josh Doan
Defencemen: Peter DiLiberatore, Robbie Russo, Lleyton Moore, Kevin Connauton, Max Szuber, Patrik Koch, Artem Duda, Montana Onyebuchi
Goaltenders: Matthew Villalta, Dylan Wells

Leaders

Calgary
Rory Kerins – 17GP, 13G, 6A
Jakob Pelletier – 17GP, 3G, 15A
Walker Duehr – 17GP, 10G, 7A
Tucson
Egor Sokolov – 13GP, 8G, 7A
Andrew Agozzino – 12GP, 3G, 6A
Hunter Drew – 8G, 5G, 3A

Notes and expectations

A month ago, the question was if Rory Kerins could keep up the production he started the season with and so far he has. He hasn’t gone more than two games without making it to the scoresheet and is averaging 3-5 shots a game. In their last game against San Diego on Wednesday, Kerins assisted on two goals and still holds the league lead in goals and assists. In the off-season, he was not a name thrown around for a possible Flames call-up this year but now that story has completely changed. 
As far as game situations go, the Wranglers have not been perfect but they have been able to bounce back. In their last game it may have been a weird fluke, but the Wranglers got burned twice on shorthanded goals early in the period. When they have not had success, it seems to coincide with how they start and the energy they have in the opening 20 minutes. However, on the other side of that, special teams have not been their downfall.
Calgary still ranks high among major special teams categories. They go into the weekend with 88.3% penalty kill success which ranks them third in the league in this category. For power play percentage, they’re at 20% putting them eighth in the league for this stat. On the road, they’re at 31.82% for power plays so a couple of goals the other way didn’t hurt them too bad. 
With these games being the second and third of the week, I imagine we will see a few minor lineup changes. Waltteri Ijnatjew should start one of these games and Jonathan Aspirot missed Wednesday but should be in for one or both of these games. The Wranglers sent Ilya Nikolaev down to Rapid City this week to get some games in as this depth hasn’t allowed him much playing time. 
This series between Calgary and Tucson starts on Friday night and is a back-to-back that will wrap up on Saturday. Both games have a 7:00 p.m. MT puck drop. You can stream these games live or on-demand on Flo Hockey for a fee and multiple FlamesNation contributors will have game updates on X (formerly Twitter).

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