The hole was just too deep to dig out of.

The Eastman Selects gave up three goals in a seven minute span of the first period and fell 5-1 to the Thunder Bay Kings in their opening round robin game of the 2017 Telus Cup West Regional "AAA" Midget Hockey Championship in Steinbach.

Cody Bruchkowski, Elijah Loon-Stewartson and Robert Tyska did the goal scoring for the Kings in that opening frame.

"I think it was combination of nerves and just not playing for awhile," said Selects defenseman Burke Heide on their tough start. "We just didn't seem ready."

Heide scored Eastman's lone goal on the power play with 4:52 left in the second period.

"The second period, I think we outshot them pretty good," said Selects head coach Dennis Senebald. "We got a goal and got the crowd back in it. We were hoping that we could rebound off that in the third which we did for the first 10 minutes. Unfortunately they got an empty net goal. Some nights bounces just don't go your way."

Jacob Brown scored that empty netter for Thunder Bay with 1:36 remaining in regulation.

Robert McCollum potted the Kings final goal of the night 13 seconds later.

Eastman goaltenders Danton Belluk and Noah Morin combined to stop 30 of 34 shots.

The Selects next round robin game is tonight at 8 p.m. at the T.G. Smith Centre against Regina.

The Pat Canadians won their opener 2-1 over the Wpg Wild.

Coach Senebald says his team has to play hard for 60 minutes against the Saskatchewan champions.

"We're going to have to make sure we come out with an effort like we did in that second period against the Kings. Playing teams at this level you got to come out every period playing hard. You've got to play every shift and you got to be ready to go."

The Wild will face Thunder Bay at 5 p.m.