NEWS

And now it gets interesting.

The Ontario Junior Hockey League’s No. 1 seed Toronto Patriots will host the Southwest Conference’s No. 4 seed the Oakville Blades in Game 1 of Round 2 tonight at Westwood Arena, and the series stacks up as a war.

Toronto cruised past the Orangeville Flyers in Round 1, outscoring them by a combined score of 25-1 over the four-game sweep.

The Blades had a slightly tougher opening stanza, beating the No. 5 Toronto Jr. Canadiens in six games, closing off the contest with a 4-3 overtime road win last Sunday.

Despite the highly hyped regular season the Pats had, with their 40 victories from 54 games, the Blades were only seven points back, posting 38 wins, the second most in the league.

Head to head, it was a battle all year as, though Toronto took three of the four games, all of the contests were by two goals or less.

Suffice it to say, Pats’ head coach John Dean is expecting a very difficult series against a Blades club that won eight of nine games to end the regular season.

“I know (Oakville head coach Mike Tarantino) very well, and every year he has a contending team that is a threat to win the whole thing; this year is no different,” he said.

“We always joke when we see each other that we kind of know exactly what the other guy is probably going to do tactically, so there won’t be too many secrets in this series. We are all looking forward to the challenge of going against Mike and the Blades; he has a really hard-working team, and a really skilled team, and it’s going to be very tough going against him and his squad, that’s for sure.”

Tarantino’s Blades are a youthful group, with an average age of just under 18 years of age, and only feature a single 1997 birth year in centreman Mack Graham.

The Pats, on the other hand, boast seven impact overagers, while 1998 birth years Lee Lapid and Nicholas Favaro have already turned 20.

Nevertheless, a very strong core of Blades, led by their captain and hard-nosed defender Bailey Newton, probable NHL draft prospect and Princeton University commit Matt Kellenberger, St. Lawrence University’s physical signee Jeff Clarke, elite starting goaltender Chris Elliot, and four other key pieces, have returned from last year’s conference final run.

Tarantino, along with general manager Jordan Selinger and their staff, have augmented those returners with all sorts of ability and character, including R.I.T. commit Thomas Maia, a skillful, creative forward, Zach Bramwell, a gifted finisher committed to Cornell, and at the trade deadline, Eric Uba, a talented youngster with a bright future at the Ontario Hockey League level.

Youngster Anthony Aguanno, who was one of the top defencemen prospects in the Greater Toronto Hockey League out of the Mississauga Rebels minor midgets last year, was added to solidify as good a Top 4 D-group as there is in the OJHL.

So, with all due respect to the Orangeville from Round 1, this Oakville team is going to be a whole new animal for the Pats to deal with.

“I think our guys are very aware of the new challenge that Oakville is going to present,” said Dean.

“If I think I have to motivate our guys to flick a switch to play against a team like the Blades, then I don’t have the team I thought I did. I think the switch has been flicked already, they’re going to work hard. We have a lot of respect for the team over there, and I don’t think anyone thinks this will be a walk in the park for anyone. I think it’s now just a matter of maintaining our pace, and trying to match their compete level, which is extremely high.” - Jamie Neugebauer

Photo courtesy OJHL Images