ESTEVAN - The Estevan Bruins and the Notre Dame Hounds will square off in a best-of-seven first round series in the Saskatchewan Junior Hockey League’s playoffs.
Games 1 and 2 will be at Affinity Place on Friday and Saturday, respectively. Games 3 and 4 are in Wilcox, with Game 3 on March 22 and Game 4 two nights later.
Game 5, if necessary, would be March 26 in Estevan, Game 6 is slated for the next night in Wilcox, and Game 7 would be March 29 in Estevan.
The games in Estevan start at 7 p.m. and Notre Dame’s home games are at 7:30 p.m.
Estevan finished first in the SJHL’s regular season with a 43-10-2-3 record, while Notre Dame was eighth at 25-27-3-2, as of the Hounds’ game Monday against the Battlefords North Stars. The Bruins were 36 points ahead of Notre Dame, and defeated the Hounds in three of four meetings this season. The last three games between the two clubs this season came after Feb. 1.
Head coach and general manager Jason Tatarnic said that since the Bruins’ final regular season game on March 5, they took a few days off to get some rest. They returned to the ice Thursday.
Tatarnic said there is some familiarity with the Hounds due to the late-season matchups, but every team makes some changes for playoffs.
“I would expect that we’ll see a few things that we haven’t seen in the regular season, and we’ll just have to adapt when we play,” said Tatarnic.
Captain Eric Houk said the players were tracking the race between Notre Dame and the Kindersley Klippers for the eighth and final playoff spot, and as the season progressed, they knew there was a pretty good chance of facing the Hounds in the first round.
“We know what we can expect from them, and how we need to play against them, and obviously those things can change as they might adjust their systems for playoffs,” said Houk.
To win the series, Houk said it will be important to grab an early lead on home ice.
“It’s a bit of an adjustment to their bigger ice surface, but I think for the type of speed we have, that it plays well to our style of game. I think if we just stick to our game, we should be good to go,” said Houk.
Containing Hounds’ forward Kevin Anderson, who was second in league scoring with 77 points in 57 games prior to the Hounds’ final regular season game, will be key. Elliot Dutil, who was fourth with 66 points in 57 games, is another offensive catalyst.
Tatarnic believes it was good for the Bruins to get a two-week break, as they’ve played a lot of games since late January.
“We feel that the rest was good for us, and hopefully we’re all fresh for those first two games, and then you need a rest after that and get ready for Games 3 and 4,” said Tatarnic.
The experience of the 20-year-olds will be more important than ever.
“We have some older guys. They’ve been playing junior hockey for a while now,” said Tatarnic. “In the playoffs, it’s not the fancy plays and the tic-tac-toes, it comes down to just hard work and making simple plays. That’s our focus is keeping the game really simple.”
Houk said it was good for the guys to heal up some injuries.
“We’re obviously still working hard in practice and getting our systems down tight,” said Houk.
Everyone is expected to be in the lineup for Game 1.
Tatarnic hopes the fan support seen in the final weeks of the regular season will continue. The Black and Gold averaged more than 1,800 fans per game over the final three games of the regular season.
“I know our players got a big boost from those big crowds, and they would love to see that continue,” said Tatarnic.
