Wheat Kings could pull this series out of the Hat

If the past two months are any indication, it would not be a monumental upset if the Brandon Wheat Kings make it to Round 2 of the WHL playoffs.

But don't bet the mortgage on Brandon knocking off the Medicine Hat Tigers in their opening-round series.

At first glance, this is a bit of a mismatch. Medicine Hat was one of the league's elite teams, a 100-point club that finished 27 points ahead of Brandon in the standings. Not only do the Tigers possess the league's leading scorer in Linden Vey (46 goals, 116 points) and sidekick Emerson Etem (45 goals), but they also have the WHL's third-ranked goalie in Tyler Bunz (2.47 goals against average, .919 save percentage).

The Tigers were also the third-best defensive team in the league (196 goals against, 79 fewer than Brandon surrendered), while the Wheat Kings have had their troubles in their own end with a rookie netminding tandem and five first-year defencemen receiving regular ice time.

To make matters worse -- at the most critical time of the year -- the Wheat Kings have again been turfed from their own building due to the annual Royal Manitoba Winter Fair, forcing Brandon to play every game in the series on the road, in either Medicine Hat or Winnipeg.

That's the bad news. The good news?

While the Wheat Kings didn't look anything like a playoff team over the first four months of the season, they matched the Tigers point-for-point over the past two months as Brandon posted an 18-6-0-1 record in the last 25 games while Medicine Hat went 16-3-2-4.

Brandon also out-scored Medicine Hat 281-265 overall this season and posted the better power play (23.2 per cent compared to 21.2), which will be key in the playoffs when teams tighten up defensively and goals are harder to come by.

But just as critical for the Wheat Kings will be vastly improving their porous penalty killing. At a dismal 74.9 per cent, Brandon's penalty killing was the second-worst in the league, while Medicine Hat was seventh best at 81.9 per cent.

For Brandon, this series comes down to four key areas:

1. Special teams. Brandon needs to win that battle to win the series.

2. Goaltending. Either Corbin Boes or Liam Liston has to step up and match Bunz save-for-save and a steal at least one game in Medicine Hat, where the speedy Tigers are going to come at the young Wheat Kings in waves.

3. Veteran leadership. Brandon's youth in goal and on the blue-line may be exposed in this series, but if they can hold their own, veteran forwards like Mark Stone, Shayne Wiebe, Scott Glennie and Matt MacKay are talented and experienced enough to lead this team to an upset.

4. Win early in Medicine Hat. Without the advantage of playing in front of their rabid fans in familiar surroundings at Westman Place, the Wheat Kings absolutely need to earn at least a split the first two games in Medicine Hat this weekend. If they are 0-2 going to essentially neutral ice in Winnipeg, this series could be over early.

But take care of those four areas and Wheat King fans may yet see Brayden Schenn back in Brandon one more time in Round 2.

PULOCK PASSED OVER: Despite his superb season, 16-year-old Brandon blue-liner Ryan Pulock came up short in his bid for Eastern Conference rookie-of-the-year in favour of Red Deer Rebels rearguard Matt Dumba.

Dumba, to be sure, is a talented defenceman in his own right. The fourth overall pick in the 2009 WHL bantam draft, he scored an impressive 15 goals and finished with 26 points in 62 games and a +24 plus/minus rating -- albeit on the top defensive team in the league, with nine players who posted a plus/minus of +24 or better. He also was protected by playing regularly on Red Deer's third D-pairing.

For his part, Pulock produced 16 more points than Dumba, firing eight goals and 42 points in 63 games, breaking Wade Redden's franchise record for points by a 16-year-old rookie defenceman. Pulock also took only two minor penalties all season while posting a +2 plus/minus rating, despite regularly facing opponent's top forwards as part of Brandon's No.1 defensive pairing. Of course, with all the rookies on Brandon's back end, someone had to step up, but the unheralded Pulock -- a seventh-round bantam selection from Grandview -- certainly proved up to the challenge.

Dumba may prove to be the superior player down the road, but when it comes to rating this season, Pulock's performance was simply more impressive.

Republished from the Brandon Sun print edition March 25, 2011 B1