Grizzlies ready to ‘answer the bell’
GAME DAY: NANAIMO AT VICTORIA, GAME 1 7 p.m. at The Q Centre
Call it, advantage Victoria Grizzlies.
The seasonal statistics all favour the local B.C. Hockey League club as it prepares for the opening best-of-seven series against divisional rivals, the Nanaimo Clippers, beginning tonight at 7 at The Q Centre.
The Grizzlies finished with 83 points, 30 better than the Clippers, including 14 more wins. The 83 points were also fourth best in the entire league behind just Wenatchee, Chilliwack and Penticton.
Victoria also defeated Nanaimo seven of eight times in head-tohead matchups in 2016-17, losing the last one, 2-1 last Saturday, in a meaningless affair for the Grizzlies, who went with just three forward lines.
So the role of favourite, in this series, will be played by GM and coach Craig Didmon’s Grizzlies.
With that, however, comes the pressure to win.
“We have expectations for ourselves,” stressed Didmon, who knows the numbers always revert to zeros across the board as the second season begins. “We’ve been a good team all year and we need to keep being a good team.
“The guys are antsy and ready to go. They’re getting on each other and they need someone to battle with. Pressure is pressure. I think these guys have played with it and we have to answer the bell, that’s all.”
All season, the Grizzlies have leapt out of their corner, throwing haymakers, while racking up an impressive 37-12-5-4 record. In comparison, Nanaimo’s log was 23-28-6-1, fourth last in the 17team league.
Cole Pickup led the Grizzlies in scoring with 27 goals and 65 points. Jake Stevens, Tyler Welsh and Nathan Looysen were next with 54, 52 and 49 points, respectively. Victoria’s Jamie Rome and Lucas Clark each had 43 points.
The top scorer for Nanaimo was Ben Solin with 39 points, followed by Matt Creamer with 36, tied with Victoria’s Keyvan Mokhtari. Solin and Creamer were the only Clippers to top 30 points, while the leading Nanaimo defenceman was Sean Buchanan with 22.
In comparison, the Grizzlies had 12 players at 30 points or better, including three defencemen as Cody Van Lierop and Brett Stirling had 33 and 31 points, respectively, behind Stevens’ totals of 54.
Matthew Galajda’s goals-against average was 2.33 and save percentage was .926 as the Grizzlies’ netminder was runner-up for the league’s most valuable player award. As a team, Victoria allowed just 143 goals against this season, third lowest in the BCHL.
Meanwhile, Nanaimo’s Evan DeBrouwer held a 3.15 GAA and .894 save percentage for the Clippers, who surrendered 199 goals while scoring 146. Victoria tallied 218 times.
“Every year is a bit different when you head to the playoffs, with regards to turning the clock to the new season,” said Clippers coach and GM Mike Vandekamp.
“When you’re in first place, you want to use the season series to your advantage and talk about it and try to build confidence from it — the fact that you’re X-amount of points ahead of a team and try not to be overconfident, but obviously you want to build off of it.
“On the other side of the scale, you want to wipe the slate clean and sell to your guys that we’re at 0-0 again,” added Vandekamp. “Obviously, we’re in that position this time around.
“I’ve been on both sides of the fence. I think this side of the fence can be enjoyable in its own way because there’s not a lot of pressure on the team. We’re excited about being in the playoffs and the challenge.”
And they have the confidence of taking the Grizzlies to overtime in the second-last meeting of the season, followed by the 2-1 win in the last clash.
“I think everyone is equal coming into the playoffs,” said Welsh, one of the Grizzlies forwards who needs to step it up in the post-season. “We’re not taking these guys lightly.
“They beat us last game and they’ve been strong the last month so we’re preparing to play a good team. We’re not too worried about that last game. It was a mean nothing game for both teams, so I think we’ll be a bit more prepared and more ready to go.”
Welsh, one of the best players in the league in the first half, has just one goal in his last 19 outings after bagging 19 in his first 32 games played. He does have eight points in his last 13 appearances, having battled injuries and illness the second half.
“Pucks haven’t been going in quite as much lately,” Welsh admitted. “I think that’s a little because of how games go closer to playoffs, with things getting tighter and it getting harder to score. I’m hoping things come around come playoff time.”
But the Grizzlies have plenty of depth and though their playoff experience lags behind the Clippers (just Pickup, Nick Guiney and Van Lierop have previously played in the post-season for Victoria), they do have experience from other leagues.
“All the guys are really excited. We have eight guys leaving next year, so it means a lot to them and a lot to the whole organization,” added Welsh. “We’re hoping for a good run. We did what we wanted to do during the regular season. That was our goal to win the Islands, now it starts fresh and we can’t look past Nanaimo.”
And that job goes to Didmon, who attempts to keep his players focused on the ultimate goal.
“Having the record we have, we expect to continue that pace,” Didmon stressed. “We also know it’s going to be tough to continue that pace.
“Mike’s a very good coach — he’s won the league, he’s been runner-up in the league and he probably has more playoff experience than most. I’m sure there’s going to be adversity that we’re going to face, but we just have to meet those challenges head-on,” added Didmon.
Game 2 of the series will be played Saturday at The Q Centre before the scene shifts to Nanaimo for Games 3 and 4 on Tuesday and Wednesday.