Saskatchewan Junior Hockey League

Elite Communications Playoff Preview

Elite Communication in Flin Flon is proud to bring you the first round of the Flin Flon Bombers playoffs, in an interesting matchup that see’s the 7th place Humboldt Bronco’s face off against the 2nd place Flin Flon Bombers.

 

Flin Flon- 36-15-7-0- 79 pts (SECOND OVERALL)

PP- 27.9% (1st)

PPGF- 83 (1st)

PK- 82.8% (5th)

GF-265 (1st)

GA- 192 (5th)

Diff- 73 (2nd)

PIM- 1152 (10th)

 

Humboldt- 28-21-7-2- 65 pts (SEVENTH OVERALL)

PP- 23.1% (2nd)

PPGF- 70 (2nd)

PK- 81.0% (8th)

GF- 219 (3rd)

GA- 206 (11th)

Diff- 13 (6th)

PIM- 1414 (4th)

HEAD TO HEAD

 

Flin Flon leads Humboldt in every statistical category.  In the season series, Flin Flon won 4 of the 6 games, with one game needing a shoot-out.

Head to Head points see Flin Flon taking 8/12 possible points, and Humboldt taking 5/12 possible points.

An interesting stat head to head see’s the Bombers and Bronco’s tied for goals for against each other with 26 each, thanks in part to an early season 9-3 beating Humboldt gave to Flin Flon at the Whitney Forum.

In 6 games head to head; 1 seven goal differential, 1 three goal differential, 1 two goal differential, and 2 one goal differentials. Generally speaking, the games have been closely played.

From the SJHL:

The Bombers really had nothing to play for the last couple of weeks as they were locked into the No. 2 position as they couldn’t catch the Battlefords and no one behind them could supplant them in the overall standings.

Whether it was because of that fact, or other things came into play, the Bombers were 3-5-2-0 down the stretch, but now that games are significant again the Bombers will be a handful.

Flin Flon had the most potent offence by a large margin with four players – Cole Rafuse, Alec Malo, Donavan Houle-Villeneuve and Tristan Lemyre – all finishing in the top 10 in individual scoring while Humboldt had just Logan Foster in that group. The Bombers will, however, have to be wary of defenceman Doug Scott as the 19-year-old had 15 points in his final four games and that number could have been higher had he not sat out the season finale against Melville.

The Bombers and Broncos met six times this season with Flin Flon winning four of those contests including one by a shootout. Another win was by a single goal and two others had late empty-net tallies to make the margin of victory look larger than it appeared. One of Humboldt’s wins was also by just a single goal with the Broncos’ other triumph – a 9-3 decision – being the lone decisive outcome.

An interesting thing to note here is that these two teams haven’t seen each other since Dec. 12 and with Humboldt winning its last six games to finish out the regular season they appear ready to make some noise in the playoffs. Flin Flon, however, had the second-best road record and third-best result on home ice so they will be tough.