Each year, the CHL playoffs provide awesome entertainment to hockey fans across North America and the 2019 version should continue this fine tradition. There are several legitimate contenders in each of the three member leagues vying for a spot in the 101st Memorial Cup in Halifax in May.
In the QMJHL, the playoff format has changed. There are four divisions and a conference system in place with conference cross-overs in the semis. Can powerhouse Rouyn-Noranda make it back to the promised land after a three-year absence?
Like the NHL, the WHL has an inter-divisional playoff system — the same one that saw Moose Jaw get knocked off by eventual champion Swift Current in Round 2 of the 2018 post-season. There is potential for the top-ranked team to suffer the same fate this season with both Everett and Prince Albert poised to get a difficult second round match-up should they even get past Round 1.
In the OHL, the old 1-8 conference format works due to the easy travel. Ottawa and London have been on a collision course since mid-season, but Guelph, Sault Ste. Marie Sudbury and Niagara would like to have their say in matters.
So with the playoffs in mind, this week we look at two sleeper teams from each CHL member league that could upset the applecart.
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QMJHL
Moncton Wildcats
1. Star Power: Jeremey McKenna and draft eligible Jakob Pelletier have been amongst the league’s leading scorers all season long. Rookie defenceman Jordan Spence has come out of nowhere, inserting himself into the conversation as the league’s top draft-eligible defenceman.
2. Special Teams: The Wildcats’ power play is operating at over 23 per cent efficiency, good enough for seventh in the league, while their penalty kill is up over 80 per cent and is ranked fourth.
3. Road Record: Moncton will likely start the playoffs away from home, where it has racked up 38 of its 77 points. The Cats have scored more and allowed fewer on average on the road than at home.
4. New Playoff Home: While their home record hasn’t been great at the brand new Avenir Centre, the new barn should be popping for its first ever playoffs.
5. John Torchetti: Hired in January to replace Darren Rumble, Torchetti should be perfectly up to speed by the time the playoffs start. He last coached in the league for the Cats in 2006-07, which is a long time to be away from the league. It has taken him a while to get in-sync with this group, but they’re getting hot at the right time and a fourth-place finish in the conference is not out of the question.
Sherbrooke Phoenix
1. They’re due: The Phoenix have not had a lot of success in their short history. In six seasons, they’ve had just one playoff series win.
2. Easier First Round: Their first-round playoff opponent should sit at least 15 points back in the weaker Eastern Conference. Rouyn-Noranda and Drummondville have dominated Eastern Conference headlines so Sherbrooke will go in under the radar.
3. Doing it by Committee: The Phoenix does not have a scorer residing in the top 20, and it has no defencemen sitting in the top 10 either. They’ve had great production from their rookie imports Oliver Okuliar and Taro Jentzsch who have combined for 84 points so far. All told, there’s only one player at a point per game or better pace, but they have a dozen players with 20 or more points.
4. Good PP: Sitting just outside the big five, Sherbrooke’s power play is hovering around 24 per cent efficiency. Jentzsch and defenceman Ryan DaSilva are the set-up men, while Samuel Poulin leads a group of six triggermen with five or more snipes on the PP.
5. Youth and Inexperience: The roster has just 148 games of playoff experience combined, and their two goalies, Dakota Lund-Cornish and Thommy Monette have yet to play in the post-season. Sometimes ignorance is bliss and with good leadership the enthusiasm of a young group can go a long way.
WHL
Moose Jaw Warriors
1. Tempered Expectations: Unlike the past couple of seasons — especially the 2018 playoffs where Moose Jaw went in as the top seed after a franchise-best 52-win, 109-point season — the Warriors won’t go into the playoffs as a prohibitive favourite this time.
2. Away from Home: Save for one lone home game, the Warriors spent a month on the road from mid-January to mid-February. During that time, the team bonded and went 9-3-1-0. Their 21 road wins ranks fourth-best in the league and it’s almost certain they will start their post-season in Saskatoon.
3. Top Line: The line of Tristan Langan, Pittsburgh prospect Justin Almeida and top scoring rookie Brayden Tracey has combined for more than 270 points and is the top scoring trio in the WHL.
4. Top D: While they don’t play together, Vancouver prospect Jett Woo and Montreal prospect Josh Brook both sit amongst the league’s top defencemen in scoring. Both will see time on Moose Jaw’s lethal power play.
5. Timmy Time: With the disappointment of 2018’s playoffs and the 2019 world juniors behind him, head coach Tim Hunter can take lessons learned from those painful experiences and apply them to this group in underdog fashion.
Spokane Chiefs
1. Tried and Tested: Once again all five teams from the difficult US Division will make the playoffs. There are no off-nights south of the border and with all of the tight competition, the Chiefs are well-positioned for playoff hockey.
2. Rough and Tumble: Spokane features a group of five regulars that are 6-foot-3 or taller. Add in pest Luke Toporowski and you have a team that can play a grinding, physical style of game, which is typically a good recipe for playoff success.
3. Best PP: Spokane features the league’s best power play at over 28 per cent efficiency. They have two solid units that can create a variety of looks from Ty Smith dishing it off to Nolan Reid’s finishing power from the point, or Riley Woods and Luc Smith providing a net-front presence.
4. Leadership: L.A. Kings prospect Jaret Anderson-Dolan and New Jersey first-rounder Ty Smith present the league’s best one-two punch when it comes to leadership. Anderson-Dolan saw time in the NHL at the start of the year, while Smith got an extended look with the Devils. Both played for Canada at the world juniors, so there’s all kinds of experience for the rest of the Chiefs to draw from.
5. Lambo: Head coach Dan Lambert has all the right credentials to lead this group into the playoffs. He won the Ed Chynoweth Cup with Kelowna in 2015 and came to within a goal of winning the Memorial Cup.
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OHL
Sudbury Wolves
1. Don’t Bring Up the Past: The Wolves have made the playoffs just once in the past four seasons and have just three playoff wins in the past five years. You have to go back to 2007 for the last time Sudbury was relevant in the post-season, losing to Plymouth in a brilliant six-game finals series. The 39 wins they’ve stacked up this season is their highest regular season total in 19 years.
2. UPL Delivers: If there’s a goalie anywhere in the CHL who can steal a series, Buffalo prospect Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen is the guy. He’s had a brilliant run in his first OHL season, sitting amongst the top three in all relevant goaltender categories, and he delivered on the biggest stage as a gold medal winner with Finland at the world juniors.
3. Still-Bud: Cory Stillman will enter the OHL playoffs for the first time as a head coach, and that can present an entire different set of challenges he can’t experienced in the regular season. Should he be faced with any issues he won’t have to look far, as assistant coach Bud Stefanski has seen it all in his time in the OHL. He has coached in the OHL finals on three occasions and has twice made appearances in the Memorial Cup.
4. Home Cooking: The Sudbury Arena is refreshing in that it is one of a select few barns that doesn’t have naming rights attached to it. It’s been around since 1951 and when its teams are good, so too are the fans. It will not be a friendly place to visit in late March. Sudbury has posted 25 home wins, and with two more home games left on the schedule, they won’t get to the franchise-best 28 home win total, but they’ll be right next to it.
5. Don’t get out of line: And if the home ice advantage wasn’t enough, the Wolves don’t mind roughing it up. The franchise is consistently amongst the most penalized teams in the OHL and this season is no different. Leading the OHL with more than 13 penalty minutes a game, the Wolves can throw out Drake or Darian Pilon at any time to settle the waters. The twins will both likely surpass the 100 PIM plateau.
Saginaw Spirit
1. Don’t forget about us: London, Sault Ste. Marie and Guelph dominate the Western Conference headlines, but tucked away in Michigan is the most exciting Saginaw team since the days of Brandon Saad and Vincent Trocheck.
2. Let’s get ready to Rumble: One of the key acquisitions made by Saginaw GM Dave Drinkill was to contact Darren Rumble after he was let go by Moncton in January. Chris Lazary was tasked with leading the Spirit after he replaced Troy Smith in December. Lazary became Saginaw’s fifth head coach since Drinkill was hired in 2015. With no OHL head coaching experience on the bench, the addition of Rumble was huge, as he had made the playoffs in four of his five full seasons in Moncton. Coming over from the QMJHL, Rumble has added bits and pieces to Saginaw’s systems, but more importantly he brings playoff coaching experience to the table. He also has a way of keeping things light when needed.
3. High Ranking Personnel: Drinkill’s on-ice additions included two former Steelheads in Florida first-rounder Owen Tippett and Edmonton second-rounder Ryan McLeod. Both players add high skill, pace and plenty of playoff experience. Cole Perfetti gets rave reviews from his peers and his numbers are off the charts. He’s surpassed the 30-goal plateau and leads all OHL rookies at more than a point-per-game. Then there’s Bode Wilde, who has torn up the league from the back-end. With an outside chance to lead all OHL blue liners in points, he’s certain to reach the 70-point mark.
4. Be Nice: Saginaw preaches discipline and it’s worked. The Spirit are the least penalized team in the OHL, averaging less than nine penalty minutes per game. Keeping the opponent away from the PP in the post-season is always a good idea, and no team has done it better all year than Saginaw.
5. Soo-ey: Those remaining from last year’s four-game sweep at the hands of Sault Ste. Marie in Round 1 of the playoffs remember it all too well. The Spirit will be hard-pressed to forget how it was embarrassed on national TV, losing the first two games of that series by a combined 13-2 score. That beat-down was accented with highlight reel goals by Barrett Hayton and Keegan Howdeshell in Game 2 on Sportsnet. If ever motivation was needed, this is it for Saginaw.
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