No, the Wranglers are not in the playoffs, but three teams are in a close race for 3rd and 4th place with only 3 wins separating 3rd from 5th place. So, who ends up out of the playoffs is anyone's guess. The Wranglers as spoiler for the rest of the season, is not that big of an issue since the T-Hawks, Jags, and Titans only play the Wranglers once or twice each. The real test will be the interplay between the T-Hawks and the Jags, and between the Titans and the Jags. The T-Hawks and the Titans only play one more time. If you look at the player stats and the remaining schedule, my bet would be the Tomahawks and the Titans are the two teams which make the playoffs. The Jaguars have to play Seattle and Eugene both 3 times each. That's a tough schedule.If you look around the league, the Puget Sound Tomahawks swept a series from Seattle recently. Two consecutive wins over the Totems is impressive. Examination of the scoresheet suggests that there was a scrum when the horn sounded ending the game between the T-Hawks and Totems. Looks like the T-Hawks will be short a couple of players for the next game because of these antics. These two Totems losses moved the Totems into 2nd place, and allowed the Generals to move into 1st.
River City beat the Generals last night in their quest to reach the playoffs. It was a close one, with the Jags winning 3:01 into overtime. Eugene scored mid-way in the 1st and then never again. The Jags scored mid-way in the 3rd, and then again in overtime. I would have liked to watch that game because I betcha' it was good defensive game. Shots were almost even between both teams. At the end of the 2nd the gamesheet showed a possible scrum between Mills (Generals) and Abudakar (Jags). Then in the 3rd, the Generals continued their "dirty bird" play with Bishop getting an ejection for spearing. Spearing is one of those nasty penalties where the intent is always to injure the other player. Must be a learned play in the Generals playbook because the "dirty birds" did the same to the Wranglers Losey when we played them. In fact, the "dirty birds" are 2nd in NorPac in penalty minutes with 1,184 only following the River City Jaguars at 1,321 minutes. The recent games between the Generals and the Jags proved to me that penalties are a way of life for both teams. Abudakar got the last laugh on the Generals scoring the overtime goal.
If the Wranglers could beat the Titans this coming Thursday and Friday it would put a dent in the Titan's playoff aspirations, but I figure the Titans are on a mission to win their remaining games. The Wranglers will have to play exceptional hockey if they want to win a game. Titans have 9 players with 20 or more scoring points, with Hollandsworth and Turley at #4 and #5 respectively as top NorPac scorers. Oh well, let's go Wranglers and make the Titans earn every goal. GO WRANGLERS!
