The Niagara IceDogs and Barrie Colts share a lot—just not a shared playoff history.
Niagara and Barrie are meeting in the playoffs for the first time since IceDogs coach-GM Marty Williamson moved south after guiding the Colts to the 2010 OHL final. Since then, each of the OHL Eastern Conference entrants has won eight playoff series and made one league final, but neither has won the J. Ross Robertson Cup.
The IceDogs of playmaker Josh Ho-Sang and goalie Alex Nedeljkovic have 10 NHL drafted players, the most of any of the final four OHL teams. Coach Dale Hawerchuk’s Colts, led by OHL scoring champ Kevin Labanc, start at home with Games 1 and 2 on Thursday and Saturday. Niagara is vying to be the first non-division champion to go to the final since 2007.
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“We see each other quite a bit during the season, and the last two seasons, they’ve had the upper hand on us,” IceDogs captain and overage right wing Anthony DiFruscia says of the Colts, who won the season series 4-2. “I think it will be nice for us to come out and show them what we actually have and show them the type of hockey we’ve been playing lately.”
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Ideally for the OHL, the least competitive second round in two decades would be followed by two tough conference finals. Whereas Niagara swept the top-seeded Kingston Frontenacs, Barrie went through younger opponents, Mississauga and North Bay.
“Each team knows each other really well,” says Colts captain Michael Webster, an overage defenceman. “But you don’t really look at the regular season. Playoffs is a new season in itself. There’s new challenges and teams are playing at a different level.”
Form says the IceDogs are the favourite, but one should not count out the Colts.
Depth
Eastern teams, typically, aren’t as deep as contenders in the cutthroat Western Conference. Niagara has a good tandem with its top two lines. Ho-Sang’s line ramps up the tempo and racks up points. The Jordan Maletta-Brendan Perlini-DiFruscia troika will likely match up against Barrie’s big Justin Scott-Andrew Mangiapane-Labanc line.
Ho-Sang leads Niagara with 15 points in eight playoff games. (Terry Wilson/OHL Images)
Niagara is deep enough that it has Chicago Blackhawks second-rounder Graham Knott on the third line.
Injuries to NHL second-rounders, Dylan Sadowy and Julius Nattinen have put a crimp Barrie’s complementary scoring. Both are expected back, which will help the Colts immensely.
Told Barrie Colts C Julius Nattinen will be back in the lineup Thursday. Dylan Sadowy remains day-to-day & will be a game-time decision.
— Gene Pereira (@GenePereira1) April 18, 2016
The thing is, Labanc’s line can put Barrie on top all by itself.
Defence
Niagara’s Aaron Haydon slipped to 154th overall in 2014 before the Dallas Stars drafted him, but he was a tower of power during the victories against Ottawa and Kingston. The IceDogs, save for a third-period collapse in their 6-5 overtime win in Game 2 against the Fronts, has kept everything ship-shape in the ‘D’ zone recently. Vince Dunn is also a savvy offensive blueliner, bringing an added element to a back end entirely composed of 19-year-olds.
In Calgary Flames signing Rasmus Andersson, the Colts also boast a premier offensive D-man who is lethal on power plays. A couple caveats about Barrie: First, it is the only team remaining that allowed 200-plus goals in the regular season; second, neither Mississauga nor North Bay was particularly deep, so Colts defenders such as Cameron Lizotte, Josh Carrick and Greg DiTomaso will have more to handle.
The IceDogs probably come in as the more pressure-tested team, although the Colts had to go seven games in the first round.
“I thought we have had nine pretty close hockey games,” Williamson says. “The Kingston series, any one of those games could have gone either way. We found a way to get it done and I anticipate the same kind of hockey against Barrie. Dale has done a great job and it’s a great franchise.”
Dominance in net
The ancients in junior hockey used to allow a Memorial Cup team to borrow a goalie from a league rival. With no disrespect intended to Erie and London’s goalies—or to either Eastern team’s MasterCard Memorial Cup prospects—Nedeljkovic would be the first choice for a pickup if that was the case today.
Nedeljkovic also led Team USA to a bronze at this year’s world juniors. (Aaron Bell/OHL Images)
The Carolina Hurricanes prospect has been the best goalie in the OHL for three seasons. Nedeljkovic has also refused to let the ‘Dogs lose their grip on decisive moments, like after their only loss of the playoffs, or in Games 2 and 3 against Kingston.
Barrie’s Mackenzie Blackwood, who meets NHL specs at 6-foot-4 and 224 lb., has been locked in lately. While it’s a small sample, the New Jersey Devils prospect has a 1.73 goals-against average and .953 save percentage in the five games since Barrie lost Game 6 to Mississauga by a touchdown.
Nedeljkovic is more of a calming presence, whereas Blackwood tends to be feistier. Stylistically, they might not have a lot in common, but the objective is the same.