The Victoria Royals have headed into the second round of the Western Hockey League playoffs the past two years as prohibitive underdogs: Against an eventual Memorial Cup-finalist Kelowna team with Leon Draisaitl and Madison Bowey last year, and a 54-win Portland squad loaded with the likes of Nic Petan, Oliver Bjorkstrand, Mathew Dumba, Brendan Leipsic and Derrick Pouliot in 2014.
The Royals head into the second round this year, beginning tonight against the Kelowna Rockets, as 50-game winners and WHL regular-season champions. But few around the league are placing the Royals in the same pantheon as the 2015 Rockets or 2014 Winterhawks, so Victoria hasn鈥檛 quite gotten that chip off its shoulder yet. And that is probably a good thing. As the most interesting man in the world says in those beer commercials: 鈥淪tay thirsty, my friends.鈥�
And thirst is what these Royals seem to have.
鈥淓ven though we won the league, some people still count us out,鈥� said Victoria forward Tyler Soy.
鈥淲e鈥檒l continue to play the underdog role.鈥�
Some may buy that argument, while others will still put Victoria as the odds-on favourites in what is the most wide-open WHL playoff race in years. Under coach Dave Lowry, nobody plays a relentless and disciplined team game better than the Royals.
The Kelowna Rockets, however, were 48-20-4 and only two wins behind Victoria. But the trend is to Victoria, with the Royals nearly unbeatable in overtaking the Rockets in the second half of the regular season while Kelowna faded down the stretch. The Rockets, though, were able to hold off a surging Kamloops Blazers team in a seven-game opening-round playoff victory.
鈥淭he talent is more spread around the league this year,鈥� noted Jack Walker, another veteran Victoria forward. 鈥淚t makes for better matchups.鈥�
Here鈥檚 the breakdown:
OFFENCE
This is where Kelowna鈥檚 talent is concentrated. Tyson Baillie had 43 goals, Justin Kirkland 31 and Dillon Dube, Rourke Chartier, Tomas Soustal all 20 or more in the regular season. But the playoffs can be a strange beast. While Baillie, Kirkland and Dube were largely held in check in the first round by Kamloops, a physical role player like Rodney Southam stepped up to score a hat trick in a crucial 4-0 victory in Game 5.
Victoria scored a Western Conference-leading and WHL third-best 281 goals. The Royals鈥� scoring is so deep and evenly distributed that it keeps the opposition guessing by providing no easy forwards to target. Alex Forsberg led the Royals with 91 regular-season points, and has five points in the playoffs. Soy set a Royals team record with 46 goals, and has followed up with five goals and nine points in six playoff games. Walker had 36 goals and 84 points in the regular season and has also put up five goals and nine points in the playoffs to match linemate Soy. Matthew Phillips led all WHL rookies with 37 goals and has added three more in the playoffs.
Advantage: Victoria
DEFENCE
The young Kelowna defence is going to have to do a lot of growing up and quickly. How Cal Foote, 17, Lucas Johansen, 18, and Gordie Ballhorn, 18, hold up to Victoria鈥檚 non-stop offensive pressure will be the key to the entire series. Much needed older balance is provided by Devante Stephens, 19, Joe Gatenby, 19, and Riley Stadel, 20.
On the Victoria side, veterans Chaz Reddekopp and Ryan Gagnon will need to continue to provide the leadership as long as captain Joe Hicketts is out of the lineup. The young blue-liners Ralph Jarratt and Scott Walford have matured faster than most expected, which has been a huge bonus for Victoria this season, as has the improving play of Russian import Marsel Ibragimov.
Advantage: Victoria
GOALTENDING
The Royals鈥� pair of rookie Griffen Outhouse, who led the WHL in the regular season with a 1.82 goals-against average in 27 appearances, and over-ager Colemann Vollrath, who was third in the league with a 2.40 GAA in 51 games, tailed off to about a C+ grade in sharing the crease in the six-game victory over the Spokane Chiefs in the opening round of the playoffs. Vollrath was 3.67 in the first three games and Outhouse 2.51 in the final three. There was a spotty night each for both, but they did what was required and the Royals advanced.
Michael Herringer of the Rockets was pressed into the starting role when Jackson Whistle was lost for the season to surgery. The Comox Valley product is mercurial. He can steal a game with his size and quick reactions, as evidenced by his two shutouts against Kamloops in the first round and 2-1 victory in Game 7. And yet he sported a 3.18 GAA in the regular season and 2.39 in the first round, so there have been nights when opposing shooters have gotten to him.
Advantage: Even
SPECIAL TEAMS
The Royals鈥� power play was just three-for-20 against Spokane before finding its mojo by going three-for-five in Game 6. The Rockets were only two-for-26 against Kamloops. The latter will need to improve dramatically if Kelowna is to have success in this series, but it does have the top-end talent to suddenly turn that around.
Advantage: Even
COACHING
Dave Lowry has taken a Royals team, that was just a pre-season afterthought in most prediction polls, to the WHL regular-season championship and now into the second round of the playoffs for the third consecutive time in his four years on the Victoria bench.
Rockets rookie bench boss Brad Ralph came out of the pro ranks, from the Idaho Steelheads of the ECHL, and has shown he can also work well with the juniors.
Advantage: Victoria
INTANGIBLES
Those are almost all on the injury front. Kelowna lost its top forward, Nick Merkley, a first-round NHL draft pick of the Arizona Coyotes, and starting goaltender Jackson Whistle to season-ending injuries. Victoria captain and Western Conference MVP Joe Hicketts, out since Game 1 of the Spokane series, and useful import forward Vladimir Bobylev, injured late in Game 5 after accumulating seven assists in the Chiefs series, both did not skate in practice Wednesday for the Royals and are unlikely to play tonight.
The other intangible is Kelowna鈥檚 playoff experience. They graduated a lot of talent from last year鈥檚 team, but there is still a returning core group that went all the way to the Memorial Cup championship game.
Advantage: Victoria, only because Merkley and Whistle are gone for good, while Hicketts and Bobylev could return at some point
Series Prediction: Victoria in six games
OTHER WESTERN CONFERENCE SEMIFINAL
Seattle Thunderbirds (45-23-4 regular season) vs. Everett Silvertips (38-26-8 regular season): The Thunderbirds have won 17 consecutive games, 13 to end the regular season, and in a 4-0 sweep of the Prince George Cougars in the first round of the playoffs.
It will be Mathew Barzal of the Thunderbirds, an NHL first-round draft pick of the New York Islanders, shooting against Carter Hart of Everett, the top-rated North American goalie for the 2016 NHL draft. But Seattle looks to have too much for the 鈥橳ips, who got past Portland in the first round.
Series Prediction: Seattle in five
