NEWS PHOTO RYAN MCCRACKEN - Medicine Hat Cubs forward Spencer Chapman (right) celebrates his team's tying goal during a Heritage Junior Hockey League game against the Cochrane Generals on Dec. 22, 2019 at the Kinplex.
rmccracken@medicinehatnews.com@MHNMcCracken
The Cochrane Generals made things interesting on Friday night.
With a 5-3 victory over the Thunder in Airdrie, the Generals are now deadlocked with the Medicine Hat Cubs for second in the Heritage Junior Hockey League’s Southern Division standings – making this weekend’s season-ending home-and-home between the clubs about as close to playoff hockey as it gets.
“We’re definitely going to treat it as a playoff series,” said Cubs co-coach JD Gaetan, whose squad can earn a first-round bye with a second-place finish. “There is some stuff on the line so it’s going to be good to get the guys going.”
The Cubs (25-9-2) and Generals (25-9-2) are tied in the season series thus far with one overtime victory apiece, meaning a split this weekend would leave the teams with identical records both overall and against each other. The tiebreaking procedures on the HJHL website don’t extend past season series results, but as Gaetan points out, the Cubs hold a four-goal edge in differential.
“I don’t know what the tiebreaker is going to be because we’re going to have identical records,” said Gaetan. “We do have the differential on them but we’ll have to see what the breaker is.”
The home-and-home action starts Saturday night at the Kinplex with a 7:30 p.m. puck drop before shifting to Cochrane for a rematch on Sunday at 5 p.m. Whoever ends up on the wrong end will host the Strathmore Wheatland Kings (11-24-1) in the first round.
A bye through that best-of-five series could go a long way toward helping Medicine Hat pull off a lengthy push ahead of their role as hosts of the Hockey Alberta Provincial Championships in April. The Cubs have been without 21-year-old captain Tavin Stadnicki since he left a 5-4 win over the High River Flyers on Jan. 10 with a lower-body injury, while starting goaltender Dawsen Savage, 18, fractured his thumb in warm up ahead of last Friday’s 6-1 victory the Coaldale Copperheads. Both could be back by the second round, making this weekend crucial for the long-term picture.
“(Savage) is actually holding a stick and stuff right now. He hasn’t practised yet, but that’s looking positive,” said Gaetan. “Stadnicki is progressing very well as well, so we can expect him in Round 2 or 3 in the playoffs.”
With Savage missing from the roster, the Cubs will be leaning hard on 18-year-old back-up Logan Leroux. The 5-foot-9, 160-pound Lethbridge product has a perfect 8-0-0 record this season, including a 44-save win against Coaldale last week that knocked the Copperheads out of contention for second.
“It’s a little tough, a little nerve-wracking, but it’s exciting,” said Leroux, who boasts a .919 save percentage and a 2.38 goals against average. “It’s going to be two big games. They’re going to be vital to how playoffs go so it’s going to be really big and really important.”
The last time Medicine Hat was in contention for a top-two spot entering the final weekend of the regular season was in 2012-13, though Coaldale managed to pull away for second through a tiebreaker.
The Generals fell two points shy of earning a first-round bye last season, narrowly missing out on second to the Okotoks Bisons.
“They’re a tough team and I know they’re going to be coming out hard,” said Cubs forward Spencer Chapman, who has 10 goals and 19 assists in 19 games this season. “I’m from Cochrane so I know a lot of the guys and I know they’re going to want blood.”
