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5 | 4 | 3 | 4 | 3 | |
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2 | 0 | 4 | 1 | 1 |
Harry Sinden used to say that there were three certainties in life: death, taxes, and the first penalty at the Forum. I was starting to understand how he felt after watching Games #3 and 4 in the Hat. In Game 3, the first penalty went to Brandon Kozun for hooking. Now, I’m a big Kozun fan, but the kid has a penchant for those penalties, so at first glance, it’s no surprise. Then I watched the replay and saw that his stick actually wasn’t within a foot of the guy’s body; he just took the guy down with a body check. Then again, knowing his reputation, knowing his size (half his hooking penalties probably come because he’s too damned small to body guys off the puck), and seeing it from ice level, instead of a camera high in the crowd, I guess I can kind of see where a ref would get that idea. So okay, fine, bad call, but justifiable.
The first call in Game 4, however, left me livid. Kyle Aschim got double-teamed from behind by, I believe, Kale Kessy and Bretton Cameron. Ref’s right there, no call. Giffen Nyren gets his glove up in one guy’s face (Cameron, I think), and he gets whistled for roughing immediately. The Tigers score on the ensuing power play to take their first true lead of the series (winning a game in OT doesn’t count; the lead lasts for zero seconds). I damned near threw something at the TV. Now, I know that the WHL’s standard of enforcement on checking from behind as slipped dramatically even in the time since I became a season-ticket holder, four years ago. But if you’re not going to call a textbook hit from behind, you might as well let the retaliation go, too. Fortunately, the Hitmen hung in there, got a super-late PPG of their own, then shut the Tigers down the rest of the way, but…ah, I’m still mad just thinking about it. What the fuck kind of idiocy is that? And that’s not even counting giving Del Cowan a goalie interference penalty on a play in which he could’ve gotten a penalty shot for being dumped into Tyler Bunz’s lap!1
Regardless, now we’re in a position to end the series on home ice and watch the Blades and Wheaties duke it out for the right to play us. The Tigers have not been as good in Calgary as they were at home, hanging Tyler Bunz out to dry a bit in the first two games. The Hitmen need to resist the urge to get overconfident, though: as we saw in Game 3, it only takes one flukey bounce to get a team back into a game and a series once they’re down, and as we saw last series, a 3-1 lead is far from insurmountable. Plus, if they put away the Tigers now, that’ll leave time for recuperation, and a few guys have looked like they’re suffering of late, as inevitably happens when you go any length into the playoffs.
A couple of quirky facts going into tonight’s game:
- Going into tonight’s games, the home team is 27-32 in these playoffs. Now, obviously, you’re going to see a bunch of series where it’s close to .500 because of four-game sweeps (two at home, two on the road), but five games below .500, most of the way through the second round? I would seriously expect that to be the other way around. Probably not terribly meaningful, given the sample size we’re talking about, but it’s kind of odd, especially since all four road teams won on Wednesday.
- The team that scores the first goal is now 2-2 in this series. After Calgary thumped Medicine Hat in the first two games, the Tigers came back from 2-0 down to win Game 3 in OT, while the Hitmen overcame an early PPGA to take a 4-1 victory in Game 4.
What does it all mean? Absolutely nothing, in all likelihood, but dumb stats like this are what make the sports writing world go ’round, and I just got an extra hundred words or so of padding into this sucker without having to give any real analysis. 
Serious opinion: the Tigers will leave it all out on the ice, but the Hitmen will finally play that tight defence for a full 60 minutes, instead of only 30-40, and emerge 2-1 victors and earn themselves a few days off before facing the Wheaties in the conference finals.
It’s go time, gentlemen.
1 – On the ensuing PK, Matt MacKenzie got away with another bad hit from behind on Mark Isherwood, which left the latter favouring his shoulder on his way to the bench. In the interest of full disclosure.
