ESTEVAN - The Eagle Sky Estevan Bruins' 2024-25 season came to an end on the weekend by splitting weekend games with the Weyburn Red Wings.
Estevan doubled up the Wings 4-2 on Friday night in Weyburn. The Bruins scored three times in the opening eight minutes of the second period to blow open a 1-1 game. Rorey Elson and Hayden Pimm scored 46 seconds apart early in the frame for a 3-1 advantage, and Rylan Ringor tallied a few minutes later. Carter Onrait had Estevan's other goal, scoring late in the first.
Josh Sale and Braigh LeGrandeur had Weyburn's goals.
Zach Shaughnessy had 38 saves for Estevan, while Preston Patenaude had 33 stops for Weyburn.
Both teams employed a quick-strike offence on Saturday. Weyburn scored three times in the opening 4:16 of the game. Roan Burgess, who recently wrapped up his minor hockey career with the Estevan Great North U18 AAA Bears, opened the scoring with his first SJHL goal. Max Chakabarti and Blake Betson added to the lead.
The teams traded goals in the second, with Steven Steranka scoring for Estevan and Lucas Schmid notching Weyburn's goal.
Goals by Wilson, Steranka and Kieran Ronan 3:10 apart in the third tied the game. It remained a 4-4 game until late in the third, when Ryder Rommelaere scored for Weyburn, and Sale added an empty-net goal with 35 seconds remaining.
Luke Norman, a 16-year-old call-up from the Battlefords Stars U18 AAA program, stopped 33 shots for Estevan. Ty Matonovich had 23 saves for Weyburn.
Estevan finished the season with an 18-31-5-2 record and 43 points, which left them 10th in the SJHL standings. The top eight teams made the playoffs. This marks the first time since 2009-10 that the Bruins have missed the postseason.
The weekend games also marked the end of junior hockey for seven members of the club: defencemen Kieran Ronan, Owen Simmons and Kaelen Whittingham, and forwards Hayden Pimm, Brady Wilson, Jacob Hufty and Rylan Ringor.
Pimm played his final full season of junior hockey with the Black and Gold. Ronan was acquired early in the season and Ringor came in at the SJHL's trade deadline. Hufty was brought in early in the season, let go due to the number of 20-year-olds at the time, and then brought back a short time later.
Simmons joined the Bruins in the 2020-21 season as a 16-year-old, and after spending some time in the U.S., rejoined the Bruins at the start of the 2023-24 season. Whittingham and Wilson spent their entire three-year junior hockey careers in Estevan; Wilson finished the 2024-25 season as the Bruins' captain.
