The race for the Founders’ Cup is down to two.
The Prince Albert Predators are seeking their first ever bid into the Founders’ Cup, a national Junior B Tier 1 tournament and in order to get there, they will need to defeat the Queen City Kings in a best-of-three series.
Predators head coach Lucas Wells says there are some similarities between Prince Albert and the Kings in how the teams are structured.
“I’ve never seen them play live, you can watch as much film as you want. I know they have a very skilled offense. They got three or four guys with 50 points already, their offense is lethal just by looking at stats and looking at film. I think that their offense is kind of pushed and carried by three guys and our offense is very much the same.”
Game 1 of the best-of-three series goes on Friday night at the Kinsmen Arena in Prince Albert. Games 2 and 3, if necessary will be played in Regina.
With the Predators only getting home advantage for the opening game, Wells says it is critical for Prince Albert to play a strong opening game.
“I think it’s huge. I think game one will really determine what happens in game two, that’s such a cliche answer. I think that if we lose tomorrow, I think that it’s going to be very difficult to go into their barn and win two straight. I think we have to use the crowd to our advantage. We have to use our speed to our advantage, and we have to feed off the energy from the crowd.”
So far this season, Queen City has posted a 7-3 record in the Rocky Mountain Lacrosse League (RMLL) and have posted a positive 15 goal differential.
The Predators qualified for the play-in series after a 15-6 win over the Saskatoon SWAT last Friday.
Wells says that victory has the Predators coming into the play-in series with confidence.
“I think it gives our guys a lot of confidence. I think that when we had said we wanted to go to Founders’, a lot of guys were hesitant. I don’t think that they realized how good that they can be. And I think that beating a Tier I team gave them that confidence. You could see it throughout our game last Friday against Saskatoon. You could see our confidence building. We weren’t getting rattled with the little things. It’s how we were playing. We take things in stride. We took command of the game, and the little pushback that Saskatoon did have, we didn’t let rattle us, and then we just kind of settled back into our own game.”
Ball drop for Game 1 of the best-of-three series is at 7:30 p.m. Friday night at the Kinsmen Arena