The Winkler Flyers dropped a 5-1 decision in Dauphin on Tuesday night, as they Orange and Black saw their four game winning streak come to an end. Eric Fawkes scored Winkler’s only goal on one of their 37 shots on net as the Flyers lost in regulation for just the first time on the road since December 18th.

Back on the road, after four straight victories at home, the Flyers took on the Dauphin Kings in their final meeting of the regular season, having earned at least a point in their five previous matchups. The Flyers were the better of the two teams out of the gate, but their lucked changed just before the five minute mark of the first period when the Kings opened the scoring.

Dauphin netminder Levi Mitchell kept his team in front throughout the opening frame as the Flyers would outshoot the Kings 13-10 in the period. The home side doubled their lead to 2-0 before the end of the period when Noah Wagner caught Dorrin Luding up high with a shot and popped in his own rebound.

The Kings continued to get the bounces in the second, as they would add three more in the first 12 minutes of the middle frame. After Dauphin’s fifth goal, Dorrin Luding was replaced by Dylan Meilun who would shut the door the rest of the way.

The third period was the Flyers’ best as they outshot Dauphin 15-4 and managed to hit the score board, 6:45 into the period. After winning the faceoff on the power-play, the defense pairing of Garrett Szeremley and Nathan Poolman got the puck down the left wing wall to Eric Fawkes who scored his fifth of the season and second in as many games to cut Dauphin’s lead to 5-1.

Unfortunately, it was too little, too late for the Flyers who were forced to settle for just their second regulation loss in the last month and first loss on the road since their December 18th loss in Portage.

Dorrin Luding finished his night with 17 saves on 22 shots and Dylan Meilun stopped all eight that came his way as the Flyers outshot the Kings 37-30 overall. Winkler was 1-for-5 on the power-play and 2-for-3 on the penalty-kill. The Flyers finished their six game regular season series with a 3-1-2 record against Dauphin.

The Flyers (33-12-5), remain in second place in the MJHL Standings as they get set to host the Neepawa Natives on Friday night. The Flyers are still 13-2-1 in their last 16 games and are 5-0-0 against Neepawa so far this season. Puck drop at the Winkler Recreation Complex is 7:30pm. You can watch the game live with a subscription to www.hockeytv.com.

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