NEWS PHOTO JAMES TUBB
Medicine Hat Tigers defenceman Tanner Molendyk passes the puck up ice in the first period of a 3-2 Game 5 win on April 4 at Co-op Place, winning the first-round series over the Swift Current Broncos.
jtubb@medicinehatnews.com@ReporterTubb
Hockeytown North, meet the Gas City.
The WHL’s two Eastern conference division leaders are set to meet in the second round of the WHL Playoffs as the Medicine Hat Tigers host the Prince Albert Raiders on Saturday for Game 1 at Co-op Place.
It’s the first meeting between the two clubs in the playoffs since 2005 and it’s only the second time that two division leaders from the same conference have met in the second round since the Portland Winterhawks took on the Kelowna Rockets in 2011.
Medicine Hat took the season series 3-0-1, the lone Raider win a 5-4 overtime victory on Feb. 8 at Co-op Place where Prince Albert scored on an extra frame power play.
The Tigers come into the series off a 4-1 first-round series win over Swift Current. Prince Albert overcame a 3-1 series deficit, beating the Edmonton Oil Kings 5-0 in a Game 7 on Tuesday.
It’s a series win by the Raiders that Tigers head coach Willie Desjardins says illustrates what kind of team their opponent is.
“They were missing a couple key guys in Game 7 with (Brayden) Dube and (Tomas) Mrsic out, both are really good players, so for them to find a way to win those last three games without those two guys says a lot about their group,” Desjardins said. “They had good structure in the game; Curtis Hunt has done a heck of a job and they made a coaching change late that seems to be working. So they’ve got a good group.”
The Raiders had a top-three power play in the regular season (28.1 per cent) and continued the efficiency in the playoffs, leading the playoffs at 33.3 per cent in the first round. On the other side, the Tigers’ playoff power play was ninth at 25 per cent.
Both teams’ penalty kills worked at similar rates, the Tigers at 81.2 per cent and Raiders 79.3.
Former Saskatoon Blade Tanner Molendyk has gotten a lot of looks at the Raiders in his five-year WHL career and says they bring a hard-working attitude to each game. He says the Tigers’ success in the first-round win should be a learning curve for the group to get the experience they can build off.
“Learning the momentum swings, everything’s going to go up and down, but in that room, it was pretty even keel,” Molendyk said. “We stayed pretty calm the whole time and that’s huge in the playoffs. You’re going to get pushed around, there’s going to be teams who take runs at you, but I think we handled that pretty good.”
Prince Albert was led offensively in the first round by defenceman Lukas Dragicevic who tallied five goals and 12 points in seven games. Centreman Aiden Oiring had six goals and 11 points.
Former Tiger Tomas Mrsic had a goal and three points through four games before he was knocked out of the series after taking a skate to the face in Game 5.
The true backbone of the Raiders is the last line of defence, overage goaltender Max Hildebrand. The Bemidji State University commit carried a strong regular season into the playoffs, running a 2.02 goals against average and a .941 save percentage in the seven-game series with Edmonton, working a 30-save shutout in the series clincher.
Between him and the Tigers are blue liners Justice Christensen, Dragicevic (Seattle Kraken prospect) and former Red Deer Rebel Matteo Fabrizi, as well as 2023 first overall pick Daxon Rudolph.
With a strong defence core and an MVP/goalie of the year candidate in net, Desjardins says they can’t get frustrated when it comes to finding offence.
“You have to be quick, you have to get pucks to the net and you have to be prepared to attack,” Desjardins said. “It’s not like it’s a big change, but for sure we’re going to have to be sharp. We’re not going to get as many chances, we have to know that, so we can’t get frustrated. We just have to make sure we’re playing hard.”
The Tigers can counter with the league’s top playoff scorer in Gavin McKenna, who is riding a 45-game point streak and is tied atop the scoring race with two goals and 16 points.
They also have captain Oasiz Wiesblatt who sits tied for first in the WHL with seven goals in the playoffs. How does he approach the series? One game at a time.
“It’s going to be a really hard series, they’re a really good team,” Wiesblatt said. “They have a really good goalie and couple guys on the back end who are strong and really good defensively, and a few good guys offensively.”
