Same teams, new series
Groundhog Day has begun anew. The Brandon Wheat Kings and Medicine Hat Tigers begin their Western Hockey League rivalry anew tonight in Alberta, 364 days after the teams last squared off in the Eastern Conference quarter-finals.
This time, however, like the 1993 comedy film starring Bill Murray and Andie MacDowell, the Wheat Kings are hoping that a little bit of practice eventually leads to a different outcome.
Wheat Kings head coach David Anning said the 2017 series has to be put behind the team.
“Last year we would have liked to have more success than we had,” Anning said. “Right now we’re focusing on this year and this year alone. We want to make sure that we’re playing well and give ourselves
the best chance for success. We’re playing a quality opponent. It’s going to be a good series, and after a quality March playing against good teams throughout the month, I think that made us better and we’re in a pretty good place right now.”
The Wheat Kings played their best hockey in March since an 11-game winning streak in late November and early December, going 7-2 in nine games, with three wins over the league-leading Moose Jaw Warriors.
Brandon had struggled with the twin issues of a tougher secondhalf schedule that included a trip through the U.S. Division, and the departure of team leaders Tanner Kaspick and Kale Clague at the Jan. 10 trade deadline for a bounty of draft picks, prospects and two players, forward Luka Burzan and defenceman Chase Hartje.
“The new guys came in and they’ve done a great job,” said forward Ty Lewis, who hit 100 points in the regular season with 44 goals and 56 assists. “We’ve really gotten a lot of chemistry now, bonded as a team and I think that’s huge for us, you know getting close as a hockey team... I think that we’re hitting our stride at the right time, heading to the playoffs hot, and hopefully we just keep things rolling.”
If the season series is any indication of what’s to come, fans are in for a treat. All four games went to overtime, with Brandon winning three. The Wheat Kings (40-27-3-2) actually finished five points ahead of the Tigers (36-28-8-0) in the standings, but are facing the Central Division champions as the top wild-card team in the Eastern Conference after finishing fourth in the East Division.
Overage captain James Shearer, one of three Brandonites on this year’s club, has a healthy respect for the Tigers.
“I think that we’re hitting our stride at the right time...” – Ty Lewis, Wheat
Kings forward
“I think there a very good structure, they obviously backcheck really good, they’re a pretty fast team too,” Shearer said. “I think we have that speed on our team too, so I think it will be a lot of fast games and it’s going be pretty physical. In playoffs, you never know what you’re going to get, it’s always a different kind of ballgame. I think both teams are going come out hard and I think whoever makes the least mistakes is going to win.”
Dylan Myskiw, who will start in net if Logan Thompson isn’t ready to go after suffering a leg injury on March 9, made one of his 22 appearances this season against the Tigers, a 4-3 victory on Feb. 24 in which he made 31 saves. Last year, Medicine Hat drew boisterous crowds of 3,583 and 3,791 into the 7,100-seat Canalta Centre, which opened in 2015. The Wheat Kings didn’t help themselves, allowing the Tigers to take a 3-0 lead in an eventual 7-2 loss in Game 1 that in some ways set the tone for the entire series.
With the 137th edition of the annual six-day Royal Manitoba Winter Fair filling all 540,000 square feet of the Keystone Centre from March 26 to 31, the Wheat Kings will once again play Game 3, Game 4 and a
potential Game 6 in Dauphin, where the Manitoba Junior Hockey League’s Kings didn’t make the playoffs.
The series drew crowds of 1,912 and 1,825 into the 1,763-seat Credit Union Place a year ago.
The home side certianly wasn’t playing its best hockey in the final two months of the season a year ago. Brandon went into the 2017 series with a 5-15-0-0 record down the stretch. Ten players from that team are no longer with the Wheat Kings, and 11 Medicine Hat players are no longer Tigers. In Brandon and Medicine Hat’s 2018 remake of Groundhog Day, which ends in overtime every game, someone will soon step up.
“It was a very close season series,” Anning said. “It’s going to be a good challenge for us here. They’re an organized team, they play with very good structure, they’re well coached and they use four lines.
“We’re going to have make sure that we play a good team game in order to be successful.”