A sibling rivalry renews when Griffin Reinhart’s Edmonton Oil Kings host younger brother Sam’s Kootenay Ice on Friday Night Hockey.
The Oil Kings are on the verge of giving Griffin summer-long bragging rights, as he held a year ago when Sam and oldest brother Max’s season ended at the hands of the Oil Kings. Edmonton leads the first-round series with Kootenay 3-1 and will have the opportunity to close out the series on home ice.
“Family is separated at the drop of the puck,” Ice head coach Ryan McGill said. “It wouldn’t matter if it was Griffin or anyone else. Sam wants to win at anything he does. He’s played very hard against Griffin and Griffin’s played very hard against him, so they’ve both done a good job of separating that.”
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Griffin emerged from last year’s playoff series with the upper-hand on his brothers, along with the tweet of the year.
He’s taking an active role in helping history repeat itself.
Programming note: Tune into Sportsnet ONE, Sportsnet East, Sportsnet Pacific and Sportsnet Ontario at 10:30 p.m. ET to watch the Edmonton Oil Kings and Kootenay Ice face off in Rogers Sportsnet’s Friday Night Hockey.
“Last year, he was pretty excited to play against both brothers in Kootenay and I know this year he’s excited to play against Sam,” Oil Kings head coach Derek Laxdal said. “Sam’s a pretty special hockey player. Our back-end’s done a great job and we have to continue to keep him off the scoresheet to be successful and (Griffin’s) a big part of that.”
McGill feels as though his team could be square with the Oil Kings in this series, if not for some tremendous goaltending from Edmonton’s Laurent Brossoit early in Game 4. Kootenay, the Eastern Conference’s eighth seed, erased a large deficit after Christmas to get the final playoff spot and finish the season as one of the hottest teams.
The Oil Kings aren’t taking them lightly.
“They went in with a full steam of confidence and every game for them down the stretch was a playoff game,” Laxdal said. “They’re well aware of how to play the hard, tight, tough games and they definitely played us hard here in the first four games.”
THE STARS: Griffin, the middle son of former Calgary Flames defenceman Paul Reinhart, is a chip off the old block. He was a big contributor for the Oil Kings in their march to the Ed Chynoweth Cup as league champions last season, and bigger things are expected for the hulking defenceman.
“He’s becoming a really good shutdown guy on our back end,” Laxdal said. “Our top six, seven guys do a great job defensively and obviously we need to have those guys up and running because we have to match up against, in our first series here, you’ve got Reinhart, you’ve got (Luke) Philp, you’ve got (Brock) Montgomery and (Jaedon) Descheneau. They’ve got legitimate 30-goal scorers on that hockey club so we’ve got to make sure that (our defencemen) are up and running and Griff plays an important part of that shutdown pairing.”
Sam Reinhart and Descheneau were two of the catalysts in the Ice’s second-half resurgence. Reinhart amassed 35 goals and 85 points to lead the Ice in scoring while Descheneau scored 30 times with 78 points. Both are pointless through four games in this series and will need to find the back of the net for their team to prolong the series.
“They’re both your leading point-getters and you know in the playoffs those two guys are going to get checked a little bit tighter,” McGill said. “They have to try to battle through those situations and just be a little quicker with the puck, a little smarter with the puck and try to get into those areas where it’s tough to get into.
“We have to solve their goalie early. There’s no doubt about it. If we get a couple odd-man rushes like we did in Game 4, we need to bury our chances.”
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NAMES TO WATCH: Last summer, Griffin Reinhart was the fourth-overall pick by the New York Islanders. Next summer, Sam could be chosen just as high by an NHL team given his intangibles. His head coach raves about him.
“He’s pro-ready right now,” McGill said. “Offensively, his instincts are unbelievable, as far as being a couple steps ahead. He’s got a real quick release in traffic and he plays really hard in traffic so that’s a real, real good sign for a young guy.
“To be 17-years-old and born in November (1995) and lead your team in points with 85 points says a lot about his character, says a lot about him as an individual and his skill level. To play against the best team’s defencemen and the best team’s lines every night who are 19 and 20, it says a lot about his character.”
Curtis Lazar regained his scoring touch after a slow start to his second season in Edmonton. He finished his sophomore campaign with 38 goals and 61 points and left a good impression on his coach.
“He’s really taking steps in his leadership on the ice,” Laxdal said. “He’s a guy that brings it every night, plays with a lot of passion, plays with a lot of heart and always has a smile on his face. We look to him to be a big leader on the ice for us in this playoff series and in the playoffs. He’s obviously been a big part of it so far.”
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THE GOALIES: Laurent Brossoit has been nothing short of brilliant ever since being the only goalie cut from Canada’s world junior selection camp in December. He was the difference-maker in Game 4 Wednesday.
“We gave up a couple breakaways early in the first period and I thought that was the difference in the game — he kept it at 1-0 and 2-0,” Laxdal said. “We made a few mistakes to give him those breakaways, but at the end of the day, he came up large for us.”
Ice starter Mackenzie Skapski made some exceptional saves in Game 2, when the Ice were victorious 2-1 in overtime. He wasn’t quite as sharp on Wednesday.
“I think he would have liked to have the third goal back (on Wednesday), I think it was a bit of a miscommunication and at that time it was 2-0 late in the second period,” McGill said. “Being down only two going into the third might have been a little bit easy to chip away at it instead of three.”
WHAT’S AT STAKE: A day off on Thursday may have been a blessing for the Ice, who were discouraged that their effort on Wednesday didn’t end with a more favourable result. They’re in tough now needing to win the next three in a row to win this series, but can still be proud of their accomplishments in getting here.
“We know how tough a building this is to play in, but at the same time, our guys are excited to play because of the fact we do have a lot of pride and we’ve come through a lot of adversity from the beginning of the year,” McGill said.
The defending champion Oil Kings saw the benefit of finishing a series early as the games got tougher late in the playoffs. They’re only looking at Friday’s game, with no talk of a repeat mentioned within the room.
“It’s two different journeys,” Laxdal said regarding this year and last. “It’s the same destination so at the end of the day, that’s part of the hat you have to wear when you are trying to defend it, but that comes naturally. For us as coaches, we really don’t talk about that. We just talk about what we need to do to be successful in this series that we’re in.”
