Chiefs Expect A Road Opener Arena Tied Up, So West Final Likely Will Start Out Of Town
The Spokane Chiefs were back at practice Monday, awaiting the survivor of the Tri-City-Kamloops playoff, preparing to open their division championship series on the road.
Normally, with home-ice advantage, a team plays two at home to open a seven-game series. But due to prior commitments at the Arena, the Chiefs will likely start in Tri-City or Kamloops this weekend.
Chiefs general manager Tim Speltz said he’s blaming no one.
“It’s tough in September to hold a weekend open in April thinking you might be in the division finals,” Speltz said. “The Arena people are great to work with. If it goes seven games, four will still be in Spokane.
“We’ve been a good road team all year. And look what opening at home did for us in the Portland series.”
The Chiefs, of course, found themselves in a 2-0 hole against Portland after opening at home.
There is a possibility the Chiefs could play the first game of the division finals at home, on Friday night. Should Tri-City sweep Kamloops at home and win the best-of-5 series 3-1, the Arena might be available on Friday for Game 1 of a Tri-City-Spokane series opener.
Still flyin’ high
The Chiefs are still up after their unprecedented four straight wins that eliminated Portland, four games to three.
Jason Podollan said being down 3-0 was like “playing Game 7 four nights in a row.
“We were fighting for our lives every night,” Podollan said. “We found a way to get it done, plain and simple. We came together as a team and a family. Right now I’m just happy to be wearing a Spokane uniform.”
Short, and to the point
Coach Mike Babcock took in Game 1 of the Tri-City-Kamloops series in Kamloops, a 2-0 Tri-City shutout on Friday night. His reaction reads like a tightly written telegram.
“Kamloops was up tight,” the coach said. “Boucher played well.”
Boucher is Tri-City goaltender Brian Boucher, who stopped 38 shots to get his second shutout of the playoffs.
The Kamloops Blazers climbed back into it with a 4-3 overtime win on Saturday night.
“We were flat (in Game 1),” Blazers captain Nolan Baumgartner said. “That’s to be expected after a seven-day layoff.”
Hmmm. The Chief have been off since Wednesday. If they open Saturday they’ll have been off 10 days.
Any cures for potential, uhh, flatness?
“We’ll practice and find out who we play,” Babcock said. “We’ve got a good scouting report on both teams, but mostly it’s a matter of preparing ourselves.
“We’ve got lots of guys sick right now (Monday morning), but that’s part of a weekend off. Some of the guys enjoyed themselves a little bit.”
More of a good thing
The telecast of the Chiefs’ Game 7 with Portland went so well that both KXLY and the hockey club are looking for an encore.
Dennis Patchin gets high marks for his call of the game - only the third hockey game he’d ever done live. Nobody else in the crew had ever worked a hockey game.
Patchin passed credit to Jim Kounce, KXLY’s director of creative services, and director Mark Richey. Rick Lukens added commentary.
“It was a credit to a lot of people at the station,” Patchin said, “from our camera guys to the engineering staff to the guys who ran the audio. We didn’t know for sure that we’d do the game until noon the day before the game, but our people jumped on it.
“Guys took it upon themselves to get things done.”
The upshot?
“That’s not the last hockey game we’ll do this year,” Patchin said. “We don’t know where or when, but we’ll do more Chiefs playoff games.”
Around the WHL
Bryan Maxwell’s punishment from the league for his March 23 confrontation with referee Brent Reiber in Lethbridge will be announced this morning. … Coming back from a 3-0 deficit to Portland was not only a WHL first, it’s a Spokane hockey first as well. Research from Paul Delaney shows that the 1949-50 Spokane Flyers rallied from a 3-1 deficit to beat the New York Rovers for the U.S. Senior championship. The ‘92-93 Chiefs knocked off the Tacoma Rockets 4-3 after trailing three games to one. No team representing Spokane in a playoff had ever come back from 3-0.
You might find tonight’s 7 o’clock Tri-City-Kamloops game on 1420 AM. That’s a Walla Walla station that carries into some Spokane-area locations. … Tri-City star Daymond Langkow has four goals and has been a presence at both ends of the ice in the first three games of the Western Division semifinals. … It beats the round-robin of a year ago, but look for more discussion on the division playoff format next year. The semifinalists this year face an impossible five games in seven nights.
Former Chief Dean Kletzel, who played 55 games here in the ‘92-93 season, is skating with Kamloops’ first line, allowing Blazers coach Ed Dempsey to split Jarome Iginla and Hnat Domenichelli. Iginla and Domenichelli skated most of the year on the league’s most productive line, but with the two stacked the Blazers got little out of their second and third lines. Iginla makes the second line a threat. … The Blazers want another crack at the Chiefs. “Our players aren’t looking past Tri-City,” a Blazers front-office spokesman said, “but they feel they have something (else) to prove. Of the eight games …, there were probably three when the Chiefs were the better team. The other five could have gone the other way.” Say what you want, the Chiefs owned the Blazers in the regular season, going 7-0-1.
, DataTimes MEMO: This sidebar appeared with the story: Tri-City leads 2-1 In Kennewick, Daymond Langkow scored three goals as Tri-City beat Kamloops 5-2 Monday night to take a 2-1 lead in the best-of-5 WHL second-round playoff series. Langkow scored twice in the first period.