It is going to be tough and it is going to be physical as the Broncos move into the Saskatchewan Junior Hockey League playoff series against the Melfort Mustangs.
“That’s really what it’s going to come down to is who wants it more and who’s willing to pay more of a price to win,” noted Broncos head coach Darcy Haugan. “I haven’t seen too many playoff series that hasn’t looked like that.”
The Broncos will kick off that series on the road, with game one in Melfort on March 16.
Heading into the series the banged up Broncos will enjoy a ten-day break between their final regular season contest and game one of the playoffs.
Having such a lengthy break will be huge, says Haugan, who notes to further enhance the rest and recovery factor the players were given some time off and were able to go home.
Players spent the latter part of the week of March 5 away from the rink, before returning to Humboldt to prepare for their first round playoff series on March 10.
Broncos stumble into playoffs
The Broncos head into the playoffs as an interesting case.
After dominating much of the second half of the season, piling up wins at an impressive rate, the Broncos took their foot off the gas, electing to rest many of their top players over the final few games, and ended the season losers of three
straight including the last two by a combined score of 11-2.
Despite the up and down end to the season, Haugan notes it is inconsequential.
“History shows you that teams have gone into the playoffs smoking hot and they’ve lost out in four straight. Teams have gone in slumping really bad and they’ve been able to go on a nice run so really it means nothing.”
Haugan notes that has been a focus of the team all season, saying what the team did yesterday has no bearing on what they will do today or tomorrow.
“Our sole priority is taking care of today and becoming better and that hasn’t changed since the day one that I got here,” he noted.
It does not matter what has happened in the last few games of the regular season, says Haugan. All that matters now is getting better for the future.
“We’d be crazy to put so much stock and emphasis into those last kind of three games. But some of the things we are going to fix is some of the habits and hopefully get guys’ focus back.”
Head-to-head
The Broncos come into the series against the Mustangs having finished with six fewer wins, and 12 fewer points.
“We know that they play a heavy game, we know what they’re about,” noted Haugan of what is facing them.
“They going into this playoff series probably on more of a high than we are because they beat Nipawin a couple of times.”
“They’ve got arguably the best D-man in the league with Loch Morrison, they’ve got good goaltending with (Evan) Plotnik and they just got (Tyler) Heidt back and they got (Kayle) Tosh. They generate a lot of offense from the back end and really all four lines can play and play a real heavy game.”
Despite the Mustangs carrying a significant edge in points into the series, the Broncos know they can play with the Mustangs having finished with a 3-3 record, which featured two straight wins and wins in three of the final four games between the two teams this season.
Despite holding the recent edge, much like their three game slide, Haugan does not put much stock into their recent success against the Mustangs, noting it is inconsequential, pointing to last year against Nipawin as proof.
“Last year when we went into the Nipawin series, we’d won three of six and we weren’t able to win a game. Goaltending’s going to be critical for us. Everything that we do, attention to detail is just magnified, every decision you make and you’ve got to be able to compete and execute.”
Mustangs defense is offensive
While the two teams played a pretty even season series, the one area the Mustangs dominated the Broncos was production from the back end, where the duo of Loch Morrison and Adam Hergott combined for three goals and eight assists.
“Our tracking’s got to be really good. We’ve got to come back with a purpose and we’ve got to be aware and alert and really just focused,” noted Haugan.
One of the areas the Broncos will have to be at their best is in their own zone, notes Haugan, who says the Mustangs forwards do a great job below the hash marks, and once a team starts collapsing on their forwards, it opens up space for the defensemen to operate.
“We’ve got to be really dialed in shift and out. But if we can play the way we are and play to our strengths, which is skating and our speed.”
Broncos top line shines
While the Mustangs got a significant amount of production out of their defensemen, it was the Broncos’ forwards, particularly their top line who did the damage for the green and gold.
The pair of Logan Schatz and Nick Shumlanski, who only played in two of the six contests, as well as Conner Lukan and former Mustang Jaxon Joseph, both of whom spent time on the Broncos’ top line, combined for nine goals and ten assists against the Mustangs this season.
“We’ve got some slick guys up front who can hopefully continue to put the puck in the back of the net and we should be able to counter how they play. It’s going to be a tough series.”
Power play struggles
As has been a concern all season, the Broncos’ power play struggled against the Mustangs managing just three goals on 23 opportunities.
“Hopefully we can get the timely goals on the power play we’re going to need but honestly it’s been a weak link in our game this year. Without a doubt it has been. But we’ve got to find ways to simplify that and try to generate more,” noted Haugan.
While special teams can play a major role in deciding a series, Haugan points to last year’s series against Nipawin as proof that there is more to winning playoff games, than winning the special teams battle.
“Last year against Nipawin we won the special teams battle. We had a better power play, we had a better penalty kill against them and we lost the series...The more that that clicks obviously the better chance you have.”
The Broncos come into the series trailing in the all-time head-to-head playoff meetings between the two teams having won just four of nine series, but the Broncos have won the last two series, and four of the last five dating back to 2002-2003.
The green and gold will look to extend that streak starting March 16 on the road, with game two coming in Melfort on March 17.
