Can the Moncton Wildcats tame the Medicine Hat Tigers? Well, that remains to be seen, but that’s the task at hand tonight.
The Wildcats had a very solid outing playing what many people think are the class of the tournament in the London Knights on Saturday night. If the Cats want to go to the promise land and claim junior hockey’s holy grail, they will have to win games like this one tonight.
In order to win tonight the Wildcats will have to shutdown not one, but two phenomenal hockey players in Cayden Linstrom and Gavin McKenna.
Linstrom returns to the Tigers lineup tonight after being held out of the tournament’s first game against the Rimouski Oceanic. McKenna’s exploits are incredibly well documented and Linstrom who was the 4th overall selection in last year’s NHL Draft can flat out play and will bring another new dimension to the Moncton Wildcats game plan.
Head Coach Gardiner MacDougall has harped on the importance of “playing their game” and “sticking to the plan” all season long which undoubtedly has led to a shit ton of success, but tonight the Wildcats better have a specific game plan in order to contain Linstrom and McKenna or it might be a long night.
The Tigers are a well-balanced team, transition well and are pretty damn dynamic when McKenna is out there. He’s an elite talent who can create something out of nothing and he doesn’t require any room to do it.
His play in traffic against Rimouski in Game 1 was truly remarkable. So, the obvious question remains how do you defend against that?
Well, who has the last change? The matchup game that Gardiner MacDougall downplayed in his postgame presser after the OT loss to London, will be a key narrative of this game tonight.
Whether it’s the pairing of Morin and McKinnon or Gill and Johansson, the Cats defensive corps will have to be ultra aware when those two players are on the ice.
The “we have to look after our game” narrative will be in full effect tonight for Moncton, but there’s no question you can bet your ass, the Cats and their staff have done their homework when it comes to McKenna, Linstrom and the rest of the Tigers.
For Moncton to be successful they will have to transition pucks and provide sustained forecheck pressure. They will have to exit their zone and gain even more puck possession and offensive zone time that they did against London.
The Wildcats can’t afford to let two players beat them and they certainly can’t afford to let two players distract them either. The Wildcats can’t afford to puck watch, they need to be assertive and take time and space away from a very skilled Tigers group and they certainly can’t give them a lot of odd man rushes either because that’s where they will flourish.
The Moncton Wildcats need to turn in their best defensive effort of the year if they want to get into the win column at the Memorial Cup.
It’s not do or die yet, but it’s time for the Moncton Wildcats to play their most complete game of the season, are they capable of it? Hell yeah. Are we going to see it? Well we will have to wait and see.
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