Lucas Punkari
Ousted in
semi-finals
yet again
The Fort Frances Lakers were hoping to be getting ready for a rematch with the Wisconsin Wilderness in the SIJHL final later this week.
Instead, they’re spending the next couple of days packing up their bags and saying their good-byes.
With a 4-1 loss Monday night at the Memorial Arena in Dryden, the Lakers were ousted in six games in their best-of-seven semi-final series with the Ice Dogs, who are back for another crack at the Bill Salonen Cup.
Momentum looked to have swung in the Lakers’ favour following a 6-3 win in Game 5 on Friday night at the Ice For Kids Arena here, but the effort head coach Wayne Strachan saw in that contest was nowhere to be found in Game 6 up in Dryden.
“I’m still really in a bit of disbelief that we didn’t come out more hungrier,” Strachan admitted.
“When you look back at how we played on Friday; we were in their face, our power play was clicking, and our penalty kill was really good,” he remarked.
“But we didn’t have the same effort on Monday, and we didn’t have anyone going to the net and paying the price to score the type of goals that we got on Friday night.”
Strachan also said the team’s slow start to the series—losing the first two games on home ice—also set them back right away, and left them with a big hole to climb out of as it progressed.
“In Game 1 [a 4-0 loss to Dryden on March 18], we shot ourselves in the foot right away by letting them jump all over us and not putting in the performance that we needed,” he stressed.
“We were much better in Game 2, and I thought we took over the play in the next three games, but were a bit unfortunate not to win in Game 4 on Thursday,” Strachan remarked.
“I think that the better team in this equation isn’t advancing to the finals, but that’s how the game of hockey goes.
“If you don’t work hard or put in the effort to create your own breaks, this is sometimes the outcome and that’s exactly what happened to us,” he reasoned.
As is often the case, special teams played a big part in the Lakers’ demise Monday night as the Ice Dogs scored a pair of short-handed goals in the series’ clincher, with Jesse Linner and Dwight Lee both solving goalie Tyler Ampe in the second and third periods, respectively.
“Linner’s goal [which put the score at 2-0] was almost like having a three-goal lead going into the third,” noted Ice Dogs’ coach Clint Mylymok.
“Any time you score a short-handed goal is huge, but it’s even more magnified in the playoffs.
“It’s such a back-breaker, momentum-wise, and it’s also frustrating for both a coach and the team when you give one up,” he explained.
The six-game series victory for the Ice Dogs also was indicative of how the season series went behind the two squads, with Dryden winning eight of the 12.
“There was nothing that I looked at going in and said, ‘That’s what we need to do in order to beat them,’ to be honest,” said Mylymok, who expects the best-of-seven league final with the regular-season champion Wisconsin Wilderness to get underway this Sunday in Spooner.
“It seems like every year you run up against a team where you end up having the more favourable match-ups for whatever reason.
“But in this series, the bottom line was that our goaltending was good and for the most part our special teams was better,” Mylymok reasoned.
Despite falling in the semi-finals for the third-straight year (twice as the Lakers and before that as the Fort Frances Jr. Sabres), Strachan feels the team can take a lot of positives from the 2010/11 campaign—most notably their 20-game turnaround in the win department.
“All in all, I think when everyone gets a chance to look back and reflect on the season, it was a good step in the right direction for the organization both on and off the ice,” Strachan remarked.
“We’re going to take a few days off here to reflect on what’s happened this year as a staff, and then the job for [assistant GM] Grant [Peaurault] and I will begin to start filling the holes of the players that are leaving,” he added.
Among those graduating from the junior ranks will be team captain and SIJHL goal-scoring leader Tyler Stevenson, forwards Jace Baldwin and Dan Smith, along with blueliners Phil Jennrich and Morgan McNeill.
“When you lose your top goal scorer in Tyler, that’s definitely going to be a big hole to fill,” Strachan admitted.
“We have some players in place here that can hopefully step up and fill those roles in Byron Katapaytuk and Blake Boaz up front,” he said.
“And on the back end, Connor Hady and Marty McFadden will both be a year older, but those [Jennrich and McNeill] are still going to be tough guys to replace.”
However, with 16 players eligible to return for the 2011/12 SIJHL campaign, along with the usual batch of newcomers, Strachan feels his club stands a chance to look pretty strong when the Lakers return to the ice in the fall.
“We’re hoping that with having the Dudley Hewitt Cup in Thunder Bay [which would give the SIJHL two teams for the tournament], that will make a lot of players really hungry to come back and return,” Strachan said.
“If we can get everyone back, that would be great, but even if we can only return 12 or 13 guys, that’s still a good start to building a team,” he reasoned.
“So we’ll definitely be on the phone and searching for those players that can fill our holes.”
