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Favourites Kelowna, Portland face challenge: WHL Western Conference second-round preview

-BY CAM CHARRON AND SCOTT SEPICH

The second round continues, with eight wins standing in the way of the dream Western Conference championship series of Portland and Kelowna, though both teams face opponents who gave them a lot of competition in their respective regular season series'.

SHAW TV subscribers can catch every game of the Portland and Victoria series.

(1) Kelowna Rockets (57-11-0-4, 118 pts) vs. (4) Seattle Thunderbirds (41-25-2-4, 88 pts)

Season series: Tied 2-0-0-2 Odds favour: Kelowna 86% Most mathematically-likely outcome: Kelowna in 5. Prediction: Kelowna in 7.

Why the Rockets should win: This is a rematch of last year's first round series when Kelowna came back from a 3-0 series deficit to win it in seven games. The Rockets have a similar roster, but their key players from last year's series such as Myles Bell, Damon Severson and Tyson Baillie are still around while midseason addition Marek Tvrdon, rookies Nick Merkley and Justin Kirkland have been added to the core along with the 17-year-old Rourke Chartier after a breakout season.

The core is for the most part healthy, with Bell the only player whose status is questionable on the Rockets' loaded roster, but he should get healthier as the series progresses. Coach Ryan Huska may want to keep him out of the first couple of games as the Thunderbirds play a very physical brand of hockey and the Rockets tend to thrive on skill. That's not necessarily a bad thing.

The Rockets have about of dominant of a top six as any team. Despite running into a hot Eric Comrie in Round 1, Kelowna won on sheer shot volume, out-shooting Tri-City 207-154 and dropping the only contest in a game where Comrie made 52 stops.

Seattle is going to have trouble finding space in the Kelowna zone against the big, puck-moving defencemen that make up the backbone of the Rockets. They, in turn, make it easy on March's WHL Goaltender of the Month Jordon Cooke and though Severson and Madison Bowey anchor a big defensive unit, and it's difficult to knock them off their game. No doubt Seattle would like to get into a few fights and take the top Kelowna players off the ice for five or ten minutes at a time, so Kelowna is going to have to keep their composure, and play the game that allows them to out-shoot and out-score opponents in massive doses. -Charron

How the Thunderbirds could win: Seattle’s roster has changed quite a bit since last year’s near-upset of the Rockets, when the T-Birds — 50 points inferior to Kelowna in the regular season — took a shocking 3-0 series lead before dropping the last four games (including Game 7 in overtime).

But the blueprint for success will mostly be the same for Steve Konowalchuk’s crew. There’s more talent this time around for the T-Birds, who won 17 more games than last season, but the team is built to take advantage of its size.

It worked in the first round. In addition to getting great goaltending from Taran Kozun in all four wins, Seattle wore down the smaller Everett Silvertips and won in five games.

Despite being big favourites, Kelowna may not be looking forward to another matchup with the Thunderbirds, who left the Rockets so battered last season that they were swept in the second round by Kamloops.

Another long series should benefit Seattle, which needs to stay physical but avoid silly penalties and mental meltdowns that have derailed the team on occasion this season.

Branden Troock stood out in the first round, scoring four goals to lead the team, while rookie Scott Eansor continued his rapid ascent, equaling his regular-season total of three goals.

Last year, the T-Birds went 0-for-27 on the power play in the Kelowna series, and they need big contributions from quarterback Shea Theodore and import forwards Alex Delnov and Roberts Lipsbergs to gain an edge on special teams this time around.

And then there’s Kozun, who’s approaching folk hero status in Kent for his play since he was acquired from Kamloops at the trade deadline (.928 save percentage in 29 games). Kozun had plenty of time to develop a distaste for Kelowna while playing for the Blazers, and outplaying familiar foe Jordon Cooke will be essential for Seattle to have a chance to move on. -Sepich

(2) Portland Winterhawks (54-13-2-3, 113 pts) vs. (3) Victoria Royals (48-20-1-3, 100 pts)

Season series: Royals 3-1-0-0 Odds favour: Portland 83% Most mathematically-likely outcome: Portland in 5. Prediction: Portland in 6.

Why the Winterhawks should win: Portland has won 10 consecutive series against Western Conference opponents, and has only lost one game in regulation in nearly three months. Those are daunting numbers to overcome for a Royals team that’s in uncharted territory in the second round of playoffs.

It’s no surprise that Victoria will want this to be a low-scoring series, but what may be a surprising is that Portland isn’t averse to tightening things up. In the first-round sweep of Vancouver, the Winterhawks allowed just 92 shots on goal over the four games — 31 of which came in the two games in Portland.

Since Mathew Dumba joined the team in early January, the Hawks have been dominating the puck in a way that’s reminiscent of last year’s WHL champs. Simply keeping the puck away from their opponents is the best defence for the Hawks, who struggled a bit earlier in the season in their own end.

The Winterhawks allowed nine goals to Victoria in four meetings this season, but went 1-1-1-1 in those games because they scored just eight times. Can the Royals really continue to give up only two goals a game to the best offence in the league? If so, they have a chance. But with Portland playing its best hockey since an early January visit to Vancouver Island, it’s hard to get the numbers to line up in Victoria’s favour.

The key will be Friday’s Game 1, when the Royals will get a chance to set the tone for the series on the road. Vancouver nearly stole the first game in the first round in Portland, but didn’t come close to winning a game after that. The Royals might need to win Game 1 to get the Hawks out of their comfort zone.

Portland scored 19 goals in the first round, with five coming from Brendan Leipsic and four from Oliver Bjorkstrand. The team’s leading regular-season scorer, Nicolas Petan, was “held” to four points in the series, continuing to what has been a relative swoon over the last month. If he gets going, even a strong defensive team like the Royals will have trouble keeping up.

Also look for goalie Brendan Burke to be a key to the series, matching up against Patrik Polivka. Burke has been very strong after the calendar turned to 2014, and stopped 72 of 76 shots in the last three games of the Vancouver series. -Sepich

How the Royals could win: As noted above by Scott, beating the Portland Winterhawks in a seven game set is a daunting task for any team, let alone the Royals. Victoria has to play as if they're betting with house money and enjoy the wins they get. While the Royals won three of four against the Hawks in the regular season, the teams were 1-1 against each other in regulation, with Victoria winning an overtime and a shootout coin flip.

While the Royals may not match the Winterhawks in terms of overall depth, they had two very productive scoring lines against a tight defensive team in Spokane during the first round. Their top duo of Brandon Magee and Ben Walker combined for four goals, while their second unit of Logan Nelson-Austin Carroll-Steven Hodges combined for six. All told, the Royals earned 16 goals in the round without just one dominant scorer.

The Winterhawks don't have many weaknesses to exploit, especially once they gain the zone with those strong forwards, so the Royals need to counter that with a puck-possession game of their own. The defence, with Joe Hicketts and Travis Brown, the two top puck-movers on the squad, can't panic in the defensive end with the puck and must out-skate the first forechecker to set up three-on-two and four-on-three rushes—and by extension, avoid the quick strike offence at each end. The last thing the Royals want is to turn this into a track meet, but controlling the puck through a crowded neutral zone could work in the Royals' favour.

Victoria must convert on a disproportionately high number of their scoring chances, and rely on Polivka to make big stops if they turn the puck over on exits. Still, the Royals should feel some confidence they can skate with Portland: the Royals were one of the few regular season teams that seemed to have the Hawks figured out, and you could argue that a three-game stretch in their schedule back in January wherein they played the Hawks thrice in eight days—winning twice—marked the volta in their season.

Another strength the Royals have in shutting down the Hawks dominant powerplay is that they don't take a lot of penalties—the Royals were 17th in the WHL in the regular season in times shorthanded, and as a result only five teams allowed fewer powerplay goals. The script for an underdog knocking off a league favourite in a seven game series has been written many times before: win the goaltending battle and win the special teams battle, and the Royals have a chance of doing both. -Charron