Bring on the Kings.
The fun got underway late last night, Tuesday, March 2, in Listowel as the Cyclones and Elmira Sugar Kings laced up the skates for Game 1 of their Junior B Midwestern Conference quarter-final series.
In an intriguing twist of fate the squads had battled just two days earlier in the regular season finale.
The Cyclones took a 5-3 win in a chippy, penalty-filled contest, setting the tone for what should be a turbulent best-of-seven set.
“I think the physical play will carry over into this series, but I also think it will be more controlled as neither team will want to give the advantage to the other,” said Listowel head coach/GM Mike Brooks.
Bobby Cook (2), Ryan Horvat, Chris Holmes and Ken Rolph provided the offence.
With the win, Listowel (27-23-1) finished third overall.
That gives them home ice advantage over Elmira (20-26-5), although the merits can be debated as the Cyclones sport a stellar road record with 17 wins to just nine losses.
The Sugar Kings took the season series 4-3, with the most emphatic game an 8-2 whipping at the Woolwich Memorial Arena, although Listowel was without several of their frontline players for that tilt.
In the other six contests the margin of victory was just 1.8 goals.
“Most of our wins against Listowel were earlier in the year before that trade with Guelph where they brought in (Dan) Mohle and (Rolph) and that’s helped them a lot too,” said Elmira GM Keith Stewart. “They’re a different team than earlier in year and they’ve had our number lately, beat us twice in a row.”
Elmira features a pair of 20 goal scorers in Riley Sonnenburg and Tylson LeBlanc, but nobody cracked the 50 point plateau.
Brandon Gorecki played the majority of their games in goal, compiling a 3.41 goals against average. Nick Horrigan wasn’t as effective but he did shut Listowel out in late January.
Stewart said the Cyclones will likely see both netminders as the series wears on.
Whoever dons the pads will be facing a lineup of five 20-goal getters, including Miles MacLean (28), Mohle (25), Cook (25), Rolph (23) and Drew Davidson (20).
“They obviously have more offence than we do, we’ll have to play strong (defence) and stay out of penalty box,” Stewart said.
If not, they’ll be handing opportunities to a Cyclones power play that sits just under 20 per cent and is heating up, factoring in the win on Sunday and also netted three in a five-minute span in Friday, Feb. 26’s 4-3 loss at home to the Guelph Hurricanes.
“We feel we have a number of different options on the power play and can mix up units if things happen to go stale,” Brooks said.
With the opener already in the books, Game 2 goes today, Wednesday March 3, in Elmira at 7 p.m.
Game 3 returns to Listowel on Friday, March 5 for a 7:30 p.m. start, then shifts back to Elmira on Sunday at 7 p.m. Unless one team sweeps, Game 5 is set for Tuesday, March 9 in Listowel at 7:30 p.m.
The last time these foes locked horns was 2007 when the Kings knocked Listowel out of the semifinals in six games.
Around the league (1) Brantford plays (8) Kitchener, (2) Waterloo faces off with (7) Guelph and (4) Cambridge takes on (5) Stratford.