Victoria Royals centre Steven Hodges (The Canadian Press)The playoffs are a clean slate. Yeah, and so was the first day of school, the first day at college and the first day at a new job.

It is hardly unheard of in the NHL for a top seed to topple early and a team which barely squeaked into the playoffs to go to the Stanley Cup final, like the Philadelphia Flyers did in 2010. Like the big league, major junior hockey also has 16-team, four rounds of best-of-7 tournaments to determine the league champions. They just don't have 30 teams in each league to create competition for those last few spots. Some of the also-rans are also teams which traded away their graduating players at midseason to rebuild for the next season.

So each spring, the playoff field includes a few teams whose chances rank slightly better than Lloyd Christmas had of getting together with Mary Swanson in Dumb and Dumber: "So you're tellin' me there's a chance."

All of the competitors are going to give it their 100 per cent, but it's not rude to point out a long shot when you see one. And there are a few: BTN resident statistician Rob Pettapiece crunched the numbers as part of this site's playoff previews. From coast-to-coast, five teams are deemed to have a 10 per cent chance or less of reaching Round 2. It is what it is.

Graham James masks his face while entering court Tuesday (The Canadian Press)

Whatever sentence sexual predator Graham James received today in a Winnipeg courtroom would never have been enough. It is a travesty, a tragedy and abrogation of justice or whatever ten-dollar words people would like to apply to.

But it is not at the heart of the matter. We need to get that it's not about his ilk, but about stopping the raping of children, the robbing of their adolescence, the retarding of their development into adulthood. There is a lesson from today's news that the former major junior hockey coach will serve just two years in prison — he got concurrent sentences from crimes against two victims — is that awareness equals change. If it won't come from the Canadian justice system, it will come from people being more vigilant about whom they entrust with their children. That is happening, it will happen. Change filters up in society; it's not handed down by a judge.

As Todd Holt, the former Western Hockey League star who was abused by James, put it in a live news conference in Cochrane, Alta., after the sentence. (You may read his joint statement with Theo Fleury here.)

"The saddest part is there are more Graham James out there ... They [child abusers] need to take notice and be scared. There's no place for you to hide anymore, those dark corners where you cower. Theo [Fleury] and I call upon all Canadians, those who have suffered and those who stand with those suffering, to demand that our government to change the laws to empower justice so that it can do what it should be. We're calling out to our politicians to step up for the 1-in-3 girls and 1-in-5 boys who will be sexually offended before the age 18 in our country. We are standing up against the weak justice system and demanding change now.

"Theoren and I are calling out to you, the people Canada and the world, to take this issue to our politicians now and demand change ... My name is Todd Holt and I stand today with Theoren Fleury and all those who have suffered or are suffering, as a victor over sexual abuse and am asking for change."

Combing all corners of the country and the blogosphere for your junior hockey headlines ...

WHL

The Brandon Wheat Kings are holding their first-round games at Winnipeg's MTS Centre and owner Kelly McCrimmon would love to see a major junior team play there permanently: "From a Brandon standpoint, it would provide us with a natural rival. We don't have a natural rival." (Winnipeg Sun)

While many Ontario cities are having record high temperatures, out in Regina the Pats are hoping it's not Beach season. As in Moose Jaw Warriors agitator Cody Beach. (Regina Leader-Post)

Question: did Sven Bärtschi really need the confidence he got from his Calgary Flames stint? He was already averaging two points per game for Portland. (Portland Tribune)

Medicine Hat Tigers goalie Tyler Bunz has signed his NHL entry-level deal with the Edmonton Oilers. (Edmonton Journal)

The Edmonton Oil Kings are becoming famous for being good. (Sportsnet)

Speaking of Portland, the Winterhawks have signed Minnesota high schooler Keegan Iverson. (Minneapolis Star-Tribune)

Graduating Swift Current Broncos captain Taylor Vause is playing for the Dallas Stars' top farm team. (Southwest Booster)

It's been 23 years since there was WHL playoff hockey on Vancouver Island. (Victoria Times-Colonist)

It might be grasping at straws but the eighth-seeded Everett Silvertips have played top-seeded Tri-City close in their past three meetings. (Everett Herald)

Edmonton Oil Kings forward Henrik Samuelsson plays with the same edge that often made his father, Ulf Samuelsson, reviled during his NHL career in the 1980s and 1990s.

The elder Samuelsson, depending on whom is telling the tale, was either a tough customer or a dirty player (the latter being a majority opinion in Canada). So it is interesting that Henrik Samuelsson, in the 2 1/2 months since he joined the Western Hockey League regular-season champion Oil Kings after playing for his father's team in Sweden, has already incurred three suspensions. The rugged winger will miss the Oil Kings' first two playoff games after getting a five-minute major and game misconduct for clipping. That's led to questions of whether that Samuelsson nameplate is a target.

Halifax Mooseheads centre Nathan MacKinnonParity is not spelled with a Q.

In a season where the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League is hosting the MasterCard Memorial Cup in Shawinigan in May, there was a 10-point buffer between the elite eight who have home-ice advantage in the first round and the other nine teams. (That's right, they played a nearly 6 1/2-month regular season just to eliminate the P.E.I. Rocket, which seems about as efficient as cutting the grass with nail clippers.)

Last season, the 11th-seeded Victoriaville Tigres were the lone lower seed to reach Round 2. This season's 6 vs. 11 matchup is similarly intriguing. Phenom Nathan MacKinnon and the precocious Halifax Mooseheads, relying on their 16-year-old superstar to spearhead their attack and another 16-year-old in goalie Zachary Fucale, drew a tough out in the Moncton Wildcats, who boast a game-stealing goalie in Roman Will and retain a few remnants of

Make no mistake, the first round is expected to play out according to form; by BTN statistician extraordinaire Rob Pettapiece's reckoning, the most likely outcome in all but one series is a five-game win for the favourites. The other is projected to be a sweep. But one thing experience has taught us about the QMJHL is the form charts can usually be thrown away after the first round. Last season's final four included the fifth and eight seeds. It will be no surprise if the Jonathan Huberdeau-

Nail Yakupov has been limited by injuries since January (OHL Images)

Time waits for no one in the post-season. Not even Nail Yakupov.

With little to dispute over the favourites in the Ontario Hockey League's Western Conference — the London Knights got the regular-season banner, the Plymouth Whalers have momentum — Yakupov's status kind of commands the focus. The consensus top prospect for the NHL entry draft has had his season disrupted by injuries and a controversial suspension. For all his talent, he has only posted 16 points in 15 OHL games since returning from the injured knee he suffered in the world-junior gold-medal game, raising doubts if he even would go No. 1 in June. His status for the start of the playoffs is also an open question after he was belted by Owen Sound's Mike Halmo on March 10.

The story going in might be whether the Sting, the fourth seed in the West, are able and ready to deliver on their potential and be a sleeper. Here are capsules on all four series in the conference, which each begin Friday.

Brendan ShinniminThe two seemingly battled neck-and-neck all through the season, right down to the final couple of weeks when a six-game winning streak by the Tri-City Americans earned the team the nod over division rival Portland Winterhawks for the top seed in the WHL's Western Conference.

They argue on the hockey rink as much as they argue philosophy; the Americans' recent graduates to the National Hockey League include goaltender Carey Price and defensive defenceman Clayton Stoner. The free-wheeling Winterhawks have recently produced future offensive stars Ryan Johansen and Nino Neiderreiter.

Indeed, the two mixed it up several times this year, nine times, and on four occasions the Winterhawks scored five goals or more on the league's top defensive team. On three occasions, the Americans held the league's best offensive team to one goal or fewer. The team's systems are much different, with Portland employing fantastic stars in Ty Rattie, Brad Ross, Joe Morrow, Oliver Gabriel and Cam Reid, who all cracked the point-per-game barrier this season. The ace in their sleeve — Sven Bärtschi — will be again available to the team now that his emergency call-up to the Calgary Flames ended with three goals in five games.

Jack Campbell (Mike Carroccetto photo)Reminding fans that junior hockey is not about wins and losses is a bold tack to take at the end of the season where there was not enough of the former and too many of the latter to satisfy a fanbase, or at least the media. But hey, Kyle Dubas did not become major junior hockey's first millennial general manager by playing it safe.

Suffice to say, Dubas' rookie season as GM of his hometown Sault Ste. Marie Greyhounds seems to have been as rocky as the Canadian Shield. The 25-year-old made the big splash to add three-time world junior goaltender Jack Campbell (as he put it: "At the time I thought, quite honestly, this was a guy who can steal rounds in the playoffs") from the Windsor Spitfires. The way it played out, with Campbell and the 'Hounds finishing out of the playoffs and the team getting upbraided by alumnus and Windsor coach Bob Boughner for some goal celebrations during a meaningless game on Saturday, pretty much lets one of junior hockey's more aggressive media corps say whatever it wants.

Ninth place with nine NHL draft picks speaks pretty loudly. It's not an enviable situation. So it was interesting to see what spin would come out of it. From Peter Ruicci:

Asked if he believes the Greyhounds underachieved, Dubas answered in the affirmative.

"Yes, with regards to wins and losses," he said. "We didn't make the playoffs and when you're one of the two teams that didn't in your conference, yes, that's disappointing."

But the GM also spoke of other ways he believes junior teams must measure success and failure.

"Fans deserve a winner," he said. "But we're also in the business of developing players. Guys such as (rookie) Darnell Nurse, Ryan Sproul and Nick Cousins were among those who absolutely maximized their development. Others didn't maximize their development. But with regards to off-ice conditioning, work in the classroom and in the community, players maximized their development. And those things are important in order to get the culture to where we want it to be, in order to be able to build a winner." (Sault Star)

Is that what people wish to hear? The tail does wag the dog quite a bit in major junior.