Scoring champ leads Bears into playoffs
Philp says securing home ice advantage crucial to launching long playoff run
It was the plan all along to have Luke Philp win the Canada West Conference scoring race for his University of Alberta Golden Bears.
Just not necessarily his plan. “No,” he said without hesitation. “I don’t know, I think our whole line has had success. When we play, we read off each other really well, and it starts from a whole team standpoint.
“As a team, we have lots of different guys who can score every night, and it’s never just one line doing the work. It comes from everyone.”
But that didn’t stop the 5-foot-10, 181-pound forward from leading the way with 40 points (11 goals, 29 assists) in 28 games to win this year’s David ‘Sweeney’ Schriner trophy.
“It was my plan,” said Bears head coach Serge Lajoie, grinning. “I got to know Luke when he was 15 at the Canada Winter Games and I saw a lot of character in him back then.
“Both Stan (Marple, Bears general manager) and I knew that, if we had a chance to get him in here, that he could have a positive impact, not just on the ice, but from the culture standpoint.”
After all, the Bears play to win, as attested by their pursuit of what would be a U Sports record 16th national championship in this year’s playoffs.
“Yeah, we had a really good start the first half,” said Philp, adding there were a few lulls in the second semester. “But I think we’ve gotten ourselves back on track for the playoffs.”
The thing is, none of those letdowns happened in the friendly confines of Clare Drake Arena, where they went a perfect 14-0 on the way to a Canada West Conference leading 23-4-1 record. Of course, finishing on top of the standings comes with not only a bye through last weekend’s opening playoff round, but also homeice advantage for the entire postseason.
“Yeah, we like to play at the Drake, that’s for sure,” said Philp, a Canmore product who scored 103 goals and 251 points in 264 regular season WHL games, mostly with the Kootenay Ice, before being picked up by the Memorial Cuphosting Red Deer Rebels in 2016.
“I think our team has had nothing but confidence playing here, and we’re pretty confident going into this weekend.”
The Bears’ playoff path begins with the Canada West semifinal round at home Friday (7 p.m.) against the Mount Royal Cougars, who are tasked with finding a way to do something no one’s been able to this year: Beat Alberta at home.
“That’s a big thing with this league, especially because with playoffs you don’t (travel for the series). Home is home,” Philp said. “That was our goal this whole year, to make sure we get home ice in the playoffs. We’re pretty happy we did that and we are ready to go.”
At the same time, the Bears’ firstplace finish and No. 2 national ranking are just numbers for the Cougars, whose pedestrian 12-14-2 record might only have earned them the sixth and final playoff spot, but also gave them nothing to lose on the way to knocking off the third-place University of Manitoba Bisons in last weekend’s quarter-finals.
This time around, there is a spot in the Canada West final as well as a berth at the U Sports championship on the line.
“What happened last weekend with Mount Royal, you could say upsetting the third seed, that’s how close this league is,” said Lajoie, whose Bears swept the Cougars in their last playoff meeting in 2016.
“One through six, there really isn’t much difference. When you look at the last two games we had against Mount Royal, they were close.”
Alberta took wins of 3-1 and 4-2 on Dec. 1-2.
“Starting last Friday, everybody had the same record, 0-0,” Lajoie said, adding the bye-week break was well deserved. “We want to come in and get right back to how we ended the season. With the exception of our last game (a 4-3 loss to the University of British Columbia Thunderbirds), the previous eight games were good, so we just have to draw on that experience.
“We needed some rest. We had some guys who were sick, guys with a lot of exams and assignments.”
ALL-STAR CALL: Philp, along with Golden Bears defenceman Jason Fram, were named Canada West first-team all-stars, while defenceman Clayton Kirichenko and forward Steven Owre made the allrookies squad. The conference’s major award winners will be announced next Wednesday.