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London Knights start 0-2 at Memorial Cup, at risk of dubious major junior hockey feat

LONDON, Ont. — Only a privileged few franchises have competed in three Memorial Cup tournaments in a row. All of them won it all at least once.

Out near Ilderton is a place called Ignominy, which is where the London Knights are at risk of settling after starting 0-2 at the Memorial Cup. What Dale and Mark Hunter have built in southwestern Ontario is nothing shy of a marvel, a magnet major junior hockey program that reloads year and year. The Knights will surely stay flush and omnipresent around the top of Ontario Hockey League long into the foreseeable future, especially after hosting a Memorial Cup where tickets at the 9,000-seat Budweiser Gardens were going for $70 a pop on the opening weekend. At the same time, there is a rather obvious reality the Knights' 5-2 loss to the Edmonton Oil Kings on Sunday puts it at risk of a historic hockey oh-fer.

London will have one more day off than Guelph before the round-robin finale on Wednesday, so there is that. There is also the prospect of Guelph eliminating the Knights for the second time. Even though the event, by design, caters to the host team who's assuming the financial risk, London seems flustered in oh so many ways.

— By hitting a rough patch at a tournament of champions. "I think everyone’s frustrated but everyone goes through it," said goalie Jake Patterson, who took over for the third period after Anthony Stolarz gave up a tally from behind the net to Edgars Kulda that restored Edmonton's two-goal lead after 40 minutes.

"It just sucks that it’s at the Memorial Cup," added Patterson, who's in the middle of a cord-cottage quandary (or not) for the second tournament in row. "We’ll try and find out what’s wrong and hopefully put so more pucks in."

— By apparently not knowing what to expect from officials. Edmonton ended up 1-8 on the power play to London's 0-for-4.

Sixty seconds into the third, London's shutdown defenceman Nikita Zadorov was penalized for boarding Edmonton's Brett Pollock on a clear shoulder-to-shoulder check. Nothing came of it, since there was a makeup call against the equivalent Oil King, Griffin Reinhart, 46 seconds later.

"There is a couple calls they could make differently," Knights wing Ryan Rupert, a Toronto Maple Leafs signing, said. "This is the Memorial Cup. I think the refs gotta put the whistles away. It’s been a ridiculous for a Memorial Cup. You look at Nik’s penalty, that’s actually a horse(expletive) call. It was body-to-body. That ref should be ashamed of himself."

— By having zero goals from forwards in 120 minutes of hockey after having eight 20-goal scorers in the regular season. Reinhart controlled the low slot and Tristan Jarry, coming off what his coach Derek Laxdal called an "okay, but not great" showing in Edmonton's loss to Guelph on Saturday, made 38 saves.

"Sometimes you’ve got to give credit to the other team," Knights coach Dale Hunter said. "They played a tight-checking game and they played well. We had our opportunities but we didn’t bury 'em."

Edmonton got two third-period goals from the Riley Kieser-Mads Eller-Luke Bertolucci third line. That trio combined for 28 regular-season goals. Five Knights had more than that individually (and Josh Anderson had 27 despite missing a month while playing for Team Canada).

"We didn't think about avoiding 0-2, we thought about attacking 1-on-1," the 19-year-old Bertolucci said. "Now we play a game against Val-d'Or. We want to chalk up another win and finish the round-robin positive (at 2-1).

"It’s someone different every night with our team."

— By having Bo Horvat miss a penalty shot (high glove) on Friday and having Rupert miss (five-hole) against Jarry on Sunday. London did everything right to earn the latter chance. Captain Chris Tierney made a smart stretch pass to spring the speedy Rupert, forcing Edmonton to haul him down.

"I want him to make the first move," said Jarry, the Pittsburgh Penguins second-rounder. "Once he commits to his move, I’m going to commit to mine. I was lucky enough to get the heel of my stick on it and have it not squeak through my pads."

— By finding out their notion of desperate hockey didn't match up to Edmonton's. Now the Yankees of junior hockey are down to their last strike.

"I think the guys should feel desperate," said Tierney, the captain. "It’s an elimination game and if we lose our whole year's done. This is something we've been working for all year. I hope the guys play desperate.

"We felt desperate this game, but obviously it’s going to be a whole another level now that it’s an elimination game. I think we’re going to be ready."

'We never really regrouped'

— By Edmonton only needing a whole 76 seconds to get the late second-period dagger from Kulda. The Knights finally ended a 123-minute, 19-second Memorial Cup scoreless skein when Max Domi served up some sweet sauce to set up Alex Basso for a one-timer goal, cutting Edmonton's lead to 2-1. Two shifts later, Kulda banked a shot in off Anthony Stolarz.

"We were pumped up, there was great optimism that we were gonna get the next one," Tierney said. "Then from behind the net, it just went off him and trickles in. We never really regrouped after that."

The hint, allegation and thing left unsaid was how a team with five weeks off couldn't get it back together. Hunter went to his go-to move of swapping goalies in hope of igniting a spark by putting in Patterson, to no apparent avail.

The Oil Kings, meantime, have adapted to their elements three provinces from home. Playing Guelph on Saturday helped the Oil Kings prepare for the stretch pass-loving Knights. Ontario Hockey League teams, who are allowed to change players after an icing, are often more willing to gamble with the long pass.

"We limited their opportunities through the neutral zone," Oil Kings coach Derek Laxdal said. "They [London] like to stretch the ice out with their skill players. It was a complete team effort and we need to bottle that up for Tuesday night against Val-d'Or."

Every new morning is a clean slate at the Memorial Cup. Needless to say, though, London is in a tight spot. It's bordering on Buffalo Bills territory, bearing in mind those 1990s Bills had to be a dynasty on some level to keep reaching Super Bowls.

Winning the host bid days before repeating as OHL champions last May put London in very regal company. Only five other franchises during the Memorial Cup's tournament era have played in three championships a row, or even three out of four.

The others all won at least once.

— The 2003-05 Kelowna Rockets: won in '04 as the host team.

— The 1992-95 Kamloops Blazers: winners in '92, '94 and '95.

— The 1991-93 Sault Ste. Marie Greyhounds, like the Knights, hosted the '93 tournament after winning back-to-back OHL titles. The 'Hounds, who won a special series to earn the host berth, won the tournament on their third crack.

— The 1978-80 Peterborough Petes sandwiched a win in '79 between runner-up finishes.

— The 1975-78 New Westminster Bruins lost successive finals during the first two appearances, but came back to win the first back-to-back Memorial Cup titles of the tournament era in '77-78.

'Pull up our socks'

The atmosphere through the tournament's first three days has been almost note-perfect. It is everything the CHL could want at its tentpole event — a hive of homespun hockey devotion contained within a full city block in the middle of London. One can sink into like a warm bath and almost wish every Memorial Cup could be like this. It is big because the Knights think and plan big, though, not because of some altruistic, may-the-best-team-win devotion to the junior game.

How would it change if London hits the bricks early? The Knights have one chance on Wednesday to avoid hearing the answer.

"We have to pull up our socks and put some in the net," Rupert said. "We're leaving the goalies out to dry."

Neate Sager is a writer for Yahoo! Canada Sports. Follow him on Twitter @neatebuzzthenet.