Winterhawks prepare for finals showdown

The Western Hockey League Championship Finals are set to begin May 3, and the Portland Winterhawks are relishing the chance to be included for the second year in a row.

Now, after a weeks-long postseason campaign, the team is getting ready to face the Edmonton Oil Kings in the WHL finals.

“It’s definitely exciting. It doesn’t come around much, so we’re going to take what we can get and run with it here,” Portland starting center Brendan Leipsic said.

The Winterhawks opened their playoff campaign by blowing through the Kelowna Rockets in a four-game sweep, outscoring the Rockets 21-9 in the process. In the next round, the Hawks jumped out to a 3-0 series lead against the Kamloops Blazers and seemed to have the series well under wraps.

That was when the team got the scare of a lifetime, and one that nearly derailed their championship hopes.

Kamloops rallied back with five consecutive goals, including two in the third period, to win 5-4 and stave off elimination. Then the Blazers blew out the Hawks on their home ice in Game 5, winning by a 7-2 margin. In Game 6, back in Kamloops, Portland raced out to another big lead of 5-2, and finally looked to have victory within their grasp. But the Blazers rallied yet again, outscoring the Hawks 5-1 in the final period to force a Game 7.

Only then did Portland pull out their long-awaited fourth victory, tightening up their defense and winning 2-0, with Leipsic sealing the victory with an insurance goal midway through the third period and goaltender Mac Carruth producing 32 saves.

With a newfound resolve, the team battled in their conference final matchup against the Tri-City Americans, winning the first two games in overtime on the road.

In the second game, Winterhawk right wing Ty Rattie scored the tying goal on a power play with under two minutes remaining in the third period. In overtime, Rattie finished off a hat trick, as well as the favored Americans’ season, on a shorthanded goal with 7:58 remaining.

Learning from the lesson of the Kamloops series, the Hawks did not relax and came out firing on the home ice. They won Game 3 3-1, and then finished off the Americans with a 4-1 victory in Game 4 to clinch the conference title. Now, all that stands between Portland and their first WHL championship since 1998 is Edmonton, and the team knows that the Oil Kings will present a stiff challenge.

“Edmonton’s a great team. But if we play our game, we’ve got a great chance,” Leipsic said.

Edmonton has lost only one game throughout the entire playoffs thus far and swept their first two series against the Kootenay Ice and the Brandon Wheat Kings. They finished with the top record in league at 50-15 and feature high-scoring center Curtis Lazar as well as possibly the league’s top goaltender, Laurent Brossoit.

Still, the Hawks look forward to the challenge ahead of them.

“We stack up really well with them. They’ve got a really good defensive core and really skilled forwards, so it’ll be interesting to see how that first game goes. I think it’ll be a very exciting series,” Leipsic said.

The Winterhawks are playing in the championship series for the second year in a row but are still looking for their first title since 1998. Some disappointment still lingers from the 2011 WHL Championship Series, in which Portland took the first game against Kootenay in overtime but lost the next four.

But instead of being worried about a repeat of that series, the team is instead inspired by it and determined to keep history from repeating itself.

“I think everyone’s pretty confident. We’ve had a great run so far, and we’re not ready to stop yet,” Leipsic said.

The first game of the series is set for May 3 at 6 p.m., at Edmonton. Home games for the Winterhawks will take place on May 6 at 6 p.m., May 8 at 7 p.m. and (if necessary) May 12 at 6 p.m. All games of the series will be carried live on the Shaw TV network in high definition and can be heard live via the WHL official website at whl.ca/page/whl-radio-broadcasts_92230.