Wild seeks title tonight
Pride hoping to extend season with victory in must-win road game
The Kensington Monaghan Farms Wild has put themselves in a position to win a championship tonight on home ice.
Now it’s up to the Wild to take advantage of the opportunity. They take a 3-1 series lead over the Charlottetown Bulk Carriers Pride into tonight’s Game 5 of the best-of-seven provincial major midget hockey championship series. Puck drop is set for 7:30 p.m. at Credit Union Centre in Kensington.
“You want to clinch at home,” said Wild head coach Kyle Dunn. “I have been preaching all series that it’s not over until it’s over.
“Obviously, closing out is going to be the hardest win. Nobody is going to give it to you, so we have to come with our best effort of the series. We are taking nothing for granted. We have to be ready Saturday night.”
Down the road in Charlottetown, the Pride knows it’s a must-win situation to extend its season.
“We have to find a way to be at our best on Saturday night, give ourselves a chance to win and continue our season,” head coach Luke Beck said.
The Wild won the first two games (8-1 and 6-2) before the Pride won Game 3 3-2 n Kensington. The Wild responded with four unanswered thirdperiod goals to win Game 4 in Charlottetown 5-2.
“We thought we played a really strong first 40 minutes, and gave ourselves a good opportunity to tie the series up,” said Beck. “Unfortunately, we came out a little bit flat in the third, and when you do that against good teams they take advantage, and Kensington did that.
“We have no choice but to turn the page and turn our focus to Saturday night. . . We approach each game with a fresh start, whether it’s coming off a win or coming off a loss.”
Dunn said he was proud of how his team responded in the third period of the pivotal Game 4.
The bench boss said the discussion in the dressing room during the second intermission was did they want the series to be tied 2-2 or leading 3-1 heading home.
“I put it mostly on the guys, challenged them to be better and they stepped up. It’s nothing the coaching staff did, it was all what the players did. After the game, the coaches talked, and we were pretty pleased with how the players responded when being challenged. They rallied themselves.”
It was only a year ago the Pride held a 3-1 series lead, but the Wild rallied for three straight wins. The Pride is hoping they can turn the trick this year.
“We knew it was going to be a tough series,” admitted Beck. “But, as we saw last year, all you have to do is win a game. If we can find a way to win Saturday, it will give us extra confidence going back to our rink (for Game 6).”
The series winner will represent P.E.I. at the Atlantic major midget hockey championship in Lantz, N.S., from March 29 to April 1.