Trojans rested and ready for Regionals

“We gave our guys a little break away from the rink and training,” Mann said. “We came back on the following Friday and have had some great practices and off ice workouts. I think the biggest thing is getting refreshed and refocused. The loss to the Blazers obviously hurt, but we got over that and got ourselves getting ready to play in regionals.”

In any other ordinary season, the Trojans’ playoff exit would have ended their season. Thankfully for them, they had a spot secured in the 2019 Telus Cup Western Regionals far in advance with Tisdale being the tournament’s host.

The Telus Cup Western Regionals is a four-team round robin tournament, featuring the three AAA midget hockey champions from the West Region: Saskatchewan, Manitoba, and Northern Ontario, with a host team from one of the three provinces being the final participant.

After they finished the regular season second overall in the SMAAAHL, the Trojans proved they could beat the best teams in Saskatchewan such as the Regina Pat Canadians, Saskatoon Blazers, and the eventual league champion Notre Dame Hounds. Now they enter the Western Regionals with a near two additional weeks to rest up and address any lingering injuries.

The Western Regionals goes on for four days. With each of the four teams playing three round robin games, and the top two in the standings move on to the championship game where the winner advances to the Telus Cup national midget championship in Thunder Bay, Ont.

If the Trojans make it to the Western Regionals championship game, they would play four games in four nights. With little margin for error in the round robin stage, Mann said it’s crucial more than ever to start on the right note.

“You don’t get a lot of time to analyze other teams and what they do,” he said. “In a short tournament like this you want to focus on your own club, make sure you’re playing your best hockey at this time of the year, and give yourself the best opportunity to be successful.”

In the round robin stage, the two teams who have the most points move on to the Western Regionals championship game. Wins are worth two points, ties are worth one, and losses are worth zero. If two teams or more are tied for points, the tie-breaking procedure’s priorities (if applicable) are:

Head-to-head record
Most wins
Highest goal differential

The other guys

With the rules explained, it’s time to look at the Trojans’ opponents:

Notre Dame Hounds – Saskatchewan

Brandon Wheat Kings – Manitoba

Thunder Bay Kings – Northern Ontario

The most familiar face of the bunch is the Notre Dame Hounds, who finished fourth in the SMAAAHL standings but went on an impressive run on route to their league championship. They swept the fifth-place Swift Current Legionnaires, defeated the first-place Regina Pat Canadians in five games, and took out the team that eliminated the Trojans – the Saskatoon Blazers – in four games.

Mann said the Hounds are similar to the Blazers.

“They’re a really big team up front,” he said. “They’ve got lots of size and speed and they’re going to come at us hard. We would like to get into a nice, tight checking hockey game – our kind of style – but they’re a team that can score some goals. We’re going to have to do a better job of getting in front of goaltenders, as their goalie (Thomas Wardle) has been as good as any goalie throughout the playoffs.

“They’re a little smaller on the backend. They skate really well back there, but I think if we can put some pressure on those guys we might force them into some turnovers. We want to make them as uncomfortable as we can and take advantage of that.”

The Trojans won the season series against the Hounds 3-1, with a 2-0 record against them in Tisdale.

Tisdale Trojans goaltender Tanner Martin makes a save during his team’s 4-1 win over the Notre Dame Hounds in November. (Aaron Schulze/northeastNOW Staff)

From Manitoba, the third-place Brandon Wheat Kings knocked off the first-place Winnipeg Wild to win the league championship. Led by the league’s leading scorer Nolan Ritchie (94 points in 47 games), Mann described the Wheat Kings as a high-flying dynamic team.

“They’re going to create a lot of challenges for our hockey club,” he said. They’re a little on the smaller side, so hopefully that works in our favour. It’ll be exciting times playing against them too. That will be our third game in three days and we know that will come down to being a big game too. We want to make sure that we get ourselves prepared and hopefully we’ll get a little bit of scouting in on them during their first two games in afternoon.”

Finally, the Thunder Bay Kings, this year’s host team for the 2019 Telus Cup. Just like how the Trojans had another life if they got eliminated in the playoffs, the Kings will have a spot secured in the Telus Cup no matter what happens at the Western Regionals.

The Kings don’t play in a Canadian AAA Midget hockey league, they played 20 games in the North American Prospects Hockey League (NAPHL) – a U18 league consisting of 41 teams from 17 programs mostly from the United States – on route to winning the league championship.

Although their NAPHL success didn’t determine if the Kings would make Western Regionals or not. They defeated the only other eligible Northern Ontario team – the Kenora Thistles – 3-0 in a best-of-five series to advance.

Even Mann admitted he doesn’t know an awful lot about the Kings.

“I know they’re an older club and they’re set to host the national championship this year, so obviously they’re going to have their team prepared to play,” he said. “I think they’re going to be a huge challenge, that’s going to be our first game in 18 days.”

Despite being more rested than their opponents, Mann expects some rust on his team with 18 days separating the Trojans’ playoff exit and opening day of the Western Regionals. With some issues of dealing with butterflies and starting out a little slower in front of the Tisdale crowd in the past, he said getting a strong start from the beginning will be talked about leading up to April 4.

“Our players realize we’ve played in front of big crowds all year long, especially our four home playoff games,” Mann said. I know we’re going to have some nerves and some jitters, but hopefully we can get those out and get everybody into the game with a couple of early hits and start rolling from there.”

The 2019 Telus Cup Western Regionals begins at the Tisdale RECplex on Thursday, April 4 where the Saskatchewan champion Notre Dame Hounds play the Manitoba champion Brandon Wheat Kings at 4 p.m., before the Trojans play the Northern Ontario champion Thunder Bay Kings at 7:30 p.m.

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aaron.schulze@jpbg.ca

by Aaron Schulze

Trojans rested and ready for Regionals

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