Greyhounds, Firebirds set to open OHL playoffs

It’s not going to be easy by any means.

The Soo Greyhounds will open up the Ontario Hockey League playoffs on Thursday night at the Essar Centre against a familiar foe in the Flint Firebirds.

It’s a series between two teams that, despite finishing 28 points apart in the standings, split six meetings during the regular season with each team winning three times in the other teams rink.

“I expect it to be tough,” said Greyhounds Coach Drew Bannister. “They’ve played us tough all year.

“They’re well coached, they’re young and they skate extremely well,” Bannister added. “They have a lot of energy. They make it difficult in the sense that they make you go 200 feet every time to earn stuff. It will be a challenge for us moving forward.”

“This is going to be a tough challenge,” said Firebirds Coach Ryan Oulahen. “They’ve basically peaked here coming into the playoffs and are playing some extremely good hockey. The big thing about them is the depth that that have. They don’t have just one guy that we need to key in on. They’ve got multiple guys, which is going to pose a challenge. It’s going to be one of those series where the expectations for us aren’t going to be extremely high but we’re going to come into it, play some free hockey and put our best foot forward.”

In addition to offensive catalysts Ryan Moore, Kole Sherwood and Nicholas Caamano, Oulahen noted the Firebirds need for depth players to step up offensively to match some of the Greyhounds offensive depth.

“For the secondary guys, we’re going to need to have a big series out of guys like Everett Clark, Ty Dellandrea and maybe even some of our kids step in and help out on the scoresheet as well,” Oulahen said. “That’s going to be the key because (the Greyhounds) get scoring from three and even four lines. They will get scoring from all of those guys. For us, it’s imperative that we have to try to squeeze some out of those guys.”

Bannister said taking away time and space will be key against the Firebirds top line.

“We’re going to prepare like we always do,” Bannister said. “That line has been very dangerous.

“Time and space against any of their lines is going to be key for us,” Bannister added. “We’re going to have to key on that line and offensively we’re going to have to make sure that we manage the puck. Defensively, we’re going to have to make sure we play very tight against them and make sure we take away their time and space.”

Oulahen would also note the impact of defencemen Mathieu Henderson, Jalen Smereck and Alex Peters on Flint’s potential success.

“For us to have some success in this series, they’re going to have to be monsters, just like they’ve been all year for us,” Oulahen said of the trio.

To compete with the Greyhounds, playing a puck possession game of their own will be important for the Firebirds.

“We’re going to try to play as much as we can in the offensive zone because (the Greyhounds) are a dynamic team when they have the puck,” Oulahen said. “They’re about as puck-possession as it gets in the Ontario Hockey League. They’re dangerous whenever they have the puck. They can quickly attack in transition and they’re fast. It’s going to be imperative that when we have the puck, we have it as long as we can and when we don’t have it, we have real hard back-pressure and good fundamentals. When you play the Greyhounds you need good fundamental hockey. You need to be on the right side of the puck. You’ve got to be defensively aware or else you can get in trouble in a real hurry.”

As for who will star in goal for the Greyhounds in game one, that announcement won’t come just yet.

“I can’t tell you that until Thursday,” Bannister joked.

The series opens on Thursday night at the Essar Centre with game two set for Saturday. Both games are 7:07 p.m. starts. The series will then shift to Flint for games three and four on Monday and Wednesday evenings. Both are 7 p.m. puck drops. Should they be necessary, game five is in Sault Ste. Marie on Mar. 31, game six is in Flint on Apr. 2 and game seven would be Apr. 4 back at the Essar Centre.

In other Western Conference playoff matchups, the Erie Otters, who finished first, will face the eighth-seeded Sarnia Sting. The Otters won both meetings between the two clubs in the regular season. The team also won 50 games for the fourth consecutive season.

The three/six matchup will be a Midwest Division meeting between the Owen Sound Attack and the Kitchener Rangers. The third-seeded Attack enter the playoffs as one of the OHL’s hottest teams, having won nine of its last 10 games with the lone blemish being an overtime loss to Peterborough on Mar. 2. Owen Sound has posted a 27-2-1-2 record since Jan. 1.

The other Western Conference series will see the London Knights take on the Windsor Spitfires in the 4-5 matchup. The season series between the two clubs saw each pick up a pair of regulation wins and an overtime victory.

In an interesting note, all eight playoff teams in the Western Conference finished the regular season with records above 0.500.

On the Eastern Conference side of the bracket, the top-seeded Peterborough Petes will face the Niagara IceDogs, who clinched the final playoff spot in the conference on the final weekend of the regular season.

The Mississauga Steelheads, who enter the playoffs as the second seed in the conference and winners of nine of 11, will face the Ottawa 67’s. 

The Oshawa Generals, seeded third, will take on the Sudbury Wolves, who won on Tuesday to clinch the sixth seed.

The 4-5 matchup will see the Kingston Frontenacs take on the Hamilton Bulldogs. The two teams were separated by just a single point in the standings and split their six regular season meetings.

The Barrie Colts and North Bay Battalion missed the playoffs in the Eastern Conference while the Guelph Storm and Saginaw Spirit were on the outside looking in in the Western Conference.