The matchups are set for the 2019 OHL playoffs. For the first time in years, there is a real balance of power in both conferences, meaning there will be no easy road for anyone to this year’s OHL championship series.
The Ottawa 67’s finished first overall and captured the Hamilton Spectator Trophy. Based on the way the regular season ended, they can expect stiff challenges from Niagara, Oshawa and Sudbury, with both the Petes and the Steelheads likely to be tough outs.
In the west, the London Knights finished second overall, fending off the Saginaw Spirit in their final game of the regular season. Along with the Knights and the Spirit, the Soo Greyhounds and the Guelph Storm complete a fearsome foursome that should wind up being paired off in the Western Conference semifinals. If you are looking for an upset possibility, focus your sights squarely on the Kitchener Rangers, who will play the Storm in the first round. Here is a look at all eight series.
#1 London vs. #8 Windsor
The Knights and the Spitfires tend to see a lot of each other in the playoffs. This is their fifth meeting in the past 11 years. London won the season series 5-1, and the one in that record was part of the shutout record Michael DiPietro set this past season.
Things to know:
London Knights
The Knights posted the OHL’s longest winning streak this season at 15 games.
London owns the No. 1 penalty-killing unit in the league. As late as February, it was flirting with a 90 per cent success rate.
Kevin Hancock, who split the year between Owen Sound and London, led the OHL in shots on goal with 329. (Thanks to the trade, Hancock also had the advantage of playing two extra games this year.)
Windsor Spitfires
Jean-Luc Foudy led all OHL rookies in assists and teamed with fellow rookie Will Cuylle on Windsor’s top offensive line. Foudy and Cuylle are both 16 years old.
Windsor forward Curtis Douglas is the biggest player in the OHL at just under six feet nine inches and 240 pounds.
Cole Purboo, Luka Boka and Connor Corcoran are the last players left on the Windsor roster from their Memorial Cup championship team in 2017.
Potential outcome:
When Windsor traded goalie Michael DiPietro, they set their clocks ahead to the future. They will want players like Foudy and Cuylle to gain valuable experience for longer runs to come. London will be looking for any challenges the Spitfires can provide to get them ready for the rough road that awaits anyone who gets to Round 2 in the west.
#2 Saginaw vs. #7 Sarnia
Saginaw came within one regulation win of London, which finished first in the Western Conference. They are skilled and balanced with a fiery goaltender and a fan base that is jamming their bandwagon. The Sting are young but offensively talented and play with as big a mean streak as you will find in the game of hockey in 2019.
Things to know:
Saginaw Spirit
The Spirit are the heaviest team in the OHL at an average of 194 pounds.
Saginaw was the least penalized team in the league in 2018-19.
Cole Perfetti led all rookies in scoring with 37 goals and 74 points. He had 32 of those points in his final 20 games and usually found himself on a line with Owen Tippett and Ryan McLeod.
Sarnia Sting
The Sting have the least amount of OHL experience on their roster among playoff teams with an average of 2.4 years per player.
Sarnia led the league in short-handed goals with 22.
The Sting allowed more goals against than any playoff team, but they were also seventh in the league in goals for.
Potential outcome:
This is Saginaw’s series to win, but how many pounds of flesh will the Spirit have to pay in order to eliminate the Sting?
#3 Sault Ste. Marie vs. #6 Owen Sound
These two teams are meeting in the playoffs for the third year in a row. Each of them has won at least one of those series. The biggest question heading in was the health of Greyhounds goalie Matthew Villalta. He was injured in Sault Ste. Marie’s second-to-last game of the year. The Greyhounds won both regular-season meetings between the teams.
Things to know:
Soo Greyhounds
Villalta has had a much better year than his numbers suggest — and his numbers are pretty good.
Morgan Frost and Barrett Hayton are two of the best and most dangerous players in junior hockey this year.
The Greyhounds are the youngest of all playoff teams with an average age of 18.53 years old.
They come at you with speed and get their defencemen into the offence as well as any team. Know where you need to be at all times defensively or they will put the puck in your net.
Owen Sound Attack
The Attack went 8-11-2 after Alan Letang took over for Todd Gill behind the bench — and keep in mind that the Attack had traded Nick Suzuki, Sean Durzi and Markus Phillips just weeks prior to the coaching change.
Owen Sound went 22-9-1-2 at home and 9-22-3 on the road, which helps to explain why there is always so much talk about the “Bayshore Bounce.”
After the departure of defencemen like Durzi and Phillips, 19-year old Brady Lyle stepped up and turned in career bests in goals, assists and points.
Potential outcome:
If Villalta is 100 per cent then Sault Ste. Marie has a decided advantage. If he is not, the Greyhounds are still the favourite, but the door will be open for them to win one in the Sault and try to take advantage of the unfriendly confines of the Harry Lumley Bayshore Community Centre to make this a series.
#4 Guelph vs. #5 Kitchener
Even with the powerful play the Storm have shown since the trade deadline (17-6-3), the Rangers have beaten them three of the last four times the two teams have met. This has everything you want in a 4-5 matchup.
Things to know:
Guelph Storm
They made more moves heading to the trade deadline than any other OHL team.
The line of Nate Schnarr and former London Jr. Knights Nick Suzuki and Isaac Ratcliffe is hard to handle.
Guelph’s roster ranks No. 1 in OHL experience, averaging 3.9 years per player.
Kitchener Rangers
This year’s squad scored more goals than the team that made it to double overtime of the Western Conference final in 2018.
The Rangers have the OHL’s No. 1 power play. It has all kinds of looks and it can be deadly. Kitchener, along with Hamilton, gave up the most short-handed goals among playoff teams.
Guys like Greg Meireles and Jonathan Yantsis are undrafted and playing for contracts. That gives them incentive to come up big.
The Rangers are the smallest team in the OHL in both height and weight, averaging five feet 11 inches and 180 pounds.
Potential outcome:
If the Storm get rolling, they will win. If Kitchener can steal one early, they can steal the series.
Eastern Conference
#1 Ottawa vs. #8 Hamilton
The Ottawa 67’s will finish with the OHL’s best regular-season record and home-ice advantage against anyone they play. Their first task is to knock off the defending OHL champions. Ottawa went 5-0 against the Bulldogs in the regular season.
Things to know:
Ottawa 67’s
Ottawa gave up the fewest goals against in the OHL this year (183). Sudbury was the only other team to allow fewer than 200.
The 67’s had the top six plus-minus players and seven of the top 10.
Marco Rossi spent much of the year as the top scoring rookie and led all other rookies in plus-minus with a plus-51.
Hamilton Bulldogs
The Bulldogs enter the post-season with six players who were part of their 2018 OHL championship team.
Every other team that played in the 2018 Memorial Cup (Regina, Swift Current and Acadie-Bathurst) missed the playoffs this year.
Arthur Kaliyev became the first Bulldog to record 50 goals in a season. (The team moved from Belleville in time for the 2015-16 season.)
Potential outcome:
Hamilton has holdovers from their championship team, but they do not have enough of them to scare the 67’s. Hamilton’s victory was making the playoffs. Ottawa is stacked, and no matter how you look at it, they get the series win.
#2 Niagara vs. #7 North Bay
These teams met on the final day of the regular season, and the Ice Dogs beat the Battalion 8-3. The scores in the next few games between them likely won’t be that lopsided, but expect Niagara to be on the right end of most of them. North Bay did win two games out of the six the teams played this year in a home-and-home series. Ten days later, the Ice Dogs acquired OHL scoring champion Jason Robertson and veteran defenceman Jacob Paquette.
Things to know:
Niagara Ice Dogs
Niagara led the OHL in goals scored with 326. That’s the highest total since the Barrie Colts scored 327 in 2010-11.
Goaltender Stephen Dhillon made more saves this season (1,686) than any other goalie in the OHL. He also did not allow a shootout goal.
No OHL team struggled more in overtime. The Ice Dogs were 0-7. They will be happy to know there is no three-on-three in the post-season.
North Bay Battalion
The Battalion are the tallest team in the OHL with an average height of six feet two inches.
Justin Brazeau, who is six feet five inches tall, scored a franchise record 61 goals this year for North Bay.
Stan Butler has coached the Battalion franchise in each of its 21 seasons since the team entered the OHL as an expansion team in 1998-99. The team has only missed the playoffs three times: in its first and fourth years and again in 2016-17.
Potential outcome:
North Bay’s top players present challenges, but they cannot match Niagara’s depth and overall skill.
#3 Oshawa vs. #6 Peterborough
These two teams represent the oldest rivalry in the OHL. They played eight games against each other this year and know each other well. Oshawa had the advantage during the season series, going 6-1-1 against the Petes. They earned at least a point in every game played in the square-cornered Peterborough Memorial Centre and also scored 12 goals in the game played between the teams on Feb. 1. When the Petes are on their game, they can compete with anyone, but consistency has been an issue for them all year.
Things to know:
Oshawa Generals
The Generals made moves for the present and the future leading up to the trade deadline and then went 20-6-1 (with one remaining) after it.
Goaltender Kyle Keyser posted the best numbers of his four-year OHL career.
Anthony Salinitri led the OHL in short-handed goals with seven.
Peterborough Petes
The Petes bookended the year with the strongest start and finish of any OHL team. They began the season 8-2 and ended 8-1-1 with one game left.
Peterborough was 18-14 before trading Pavel Gogolev and draft picks to Guelph for Ryan Merkley. They were 6-15-1-2 before their late-season burst.
Merkley led all OHL defencemen in assists.
Potential outcomes:
Oshawa surprised more than a few fans when they made a number of moves around the trade deadline and then played really well down the stretch. Additions from the defending champion Bulldogs give them added advantage. Merkley can be a nightmare for his opponents. If Peterborough is going to win, he has to be a difference-maker at both ends of the ice.
#4 Sudbury Wolves vs. #5 Mississauga Steelheads
Sudbury beat Mississauga four times in six games this year. Two of those saw the Wolves shut out the Steelheads. In the last three meetings, Sudbury held Mississauga to just two total goals.
Things to know:
Sudbury Wolves
Goalie Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen posted the best save percentage in the OHL this season.
Sudbury was the most penalized team in the OHL this year, averaging 13.7 penalty minutes per game.
The Wolves won 40 games for the first time since 1994-95. Their leading scorer that year was Zdenek Nedved. He is now 44 years old and has been retired from hockey since 2010-11.
Mississauga Steelheads
Following the trades of Owen Tippett and Ryan McLeod, the Steelheads kept their heads above water, going 13-12-1-1 the rest of the way, with one game remaining.
Jacob Ingham was second to only Dhillon of Niagara in minutes played.
Both Mississauga’s power play and penalty kill rank inside the top nine in the league.
Potential outcomes:
It is nearly impossible to outwork the Steelheads, but it may be even harder to score on the Wolves’ Luukkonen. Mississauga finished 12th in the OHL in goals scored. The Wolves’ Achilles heels would be an injury to Luukkonen or their lack of experience on the playoff stage — unless either of those enters into the picture, they will advance.
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