Gulls make cup race intriguing

Published on March 25, 2002 under West Coast Hockey League (WCHL) News Release

BOISE, Idaho - The West Coast Hockey League Founders Cup is awarded to the team with the best regular season record. San Diego has won the trophy four of the league's first six seasons and does not appear willing to relinquish the award this season. The Gulls have won five straight games to pull within six points of Idaho in the race for the Founders Cup. San Diego has a game in hand on the Steelheads, who play five of their final six games on the road.

To win their fifth Founders Cup the Gulls must first hold off the surging Long Beach Ice Dogs. Long Beach has won four straight and 15 of their last 17 games. The Ice Dogs trail San Diego by eight points for the division lead, but own a game in hand and face the Gulls two times the final week of the season. San Diego's magic number to clinch the division stands at five, entering play this week, as they begin a four-game road trip. The Gulls gained two important wins over the weekend in a two-game sweep of Tacoma. San Diego easily handled Tacoma on Saturday in a 6-2 blowout and rallied from a 2-1 deficit on Sunday to earn a 4-2 victory.

Idaho leads the Founders Cup race with 95 points, however they have faltered of late going 6-4-2 over their last 12 games. Idaho handed the Bakersfield Condors a 4-1 defeat on Friday but fell 5-3 to the Condors on Saturday. The Steelheads close the season with five of their final six games on the road, including a three-game trip to Anchorage this week. Idaho is 9-1-0 versus the Aces this season but the two teams last met January 5th when the makeup of each team was markedly different. Idaho's magic number to clinch their first Founders Cup and home-ice advantage for the duration of the Taylor Cup playoffs is five.

The race for the Founders Cup and the Southern Division crown will make for an interesting finish to the WCHL's seventh season.

NORTHERN DIVISION PLAYOFF SERIES DATES SET

BOISE, Idaho - The Northern Division's first round playoff series are set with Idaho hosting Anchorage and Colorado facing off against Tacoma. Colorado and Tacoma will start in Tacoma despite Colorado being the higher seed. The Gold Kings' World Arena is unavailable to start the series necessitating the change in venues. The Southern Division matchups are still to be determined and playoff dates for those series will be released at a later date. The Northern Division schedule is as follows:

Anchorage vs. Idaho, Series "A" Tacoma vs. Colorado, Series "B"
Friday, April 12 at Idaho Friday, April 12 at Tacoma
Saturday, April 13 at Idaho Saturday, April 13 at Tacoma
Wednesday, April 17 at Anchorage Monday, April 15 at Colorado
Friday, April 19 at Anchorage * Tuesday, April 16 at Colorado *
Saturday, April 20 at Idaho * Wednesday, April 17 at Colorado *

WCHL Team-by-Team Notes: Thru March 24, 2002

Anchorage (18-40-9, 45 PTS, Fourth Place, Northern)...Anchorage dropped three consecutive road games this week to leave their road record at 9-20-5...The Aces added veteran goaltender Parris Duffus to the roster this week. He replaces Olie Sundstrom who was waived...Sasha Lakovic acquired in a pre-deadline trade, agreed to join the team...Shane Calder was waived last week by Anchorage. He had 13 goals and 12 assists in 43 games for the Aces...The Aces have scored first 25 times this season, lowest in the WCHL.

Bakersfield (27-35-5, 59 PTS, Fourth Place, Southern)...Bakersfield continued their late season turn around with wins over WCHL-leading Idaho and Tacoma last week...The Condors added four new players to the roster last week. Aaron Brand, Ryan Foster, and Patrick Aronsson all joined the team from Europe while Gable Gross comes to the Condors from the junior ranks...Foster had three goals and two assists in his first six games with the Condors, while Brand netted two goals and three assists in his first five games...Jason Firth recorded a hat trick in the Condors' 6-4 win over Tacoma on Wednesday.

Colorado (35-24-7, 77 PTS, Second Place, Northern)...Colorado continued to struggle, going 0-2-1 last week, and are now winless in six straight...The Gold Kings acquired defenseman Ryan Tocher in a deadline deal with Fresno...The team concludes a 7-game road trip this week with games in Bakersfield and Fresno before finishing the season with four games at the World Arena...Colorado is 2-18-3 when trailing after two periods of play...The Gold Kings added Xavier Majic and Cody Bowtell to their roster last week.

Fresno (28-29-8, 64 PTS, Third Place, Southern)...The Falcons won both contests versus the Anchorage Aces last week...Fresno defeated Anchorage 6-2 before a sell-out crowd of 8,761 on Saturday. The sell-out enabled the Falcons to record a franchise attendance record for the second consecutive season...Fresno is tied with San Diego for the WCHL lead in shorthanded goals scored with 15...The Falcons rank second among WCHL teams in shots per game, firing 31.29 shots per game at opposing netminders.

Idaho (44-15-7, 95 PTS, First Place, Northern)...Idaho won two of three games at home last week and could tie the WCHL single-season record for home victories with a win over Tacoma during the final week of the season...Idaho signed center Greg Bullock last week...The Steelheads are 26-2-1 when scoring the first goal of the game...Kevin Smyth has scored a goal in five consecutive games...Bobby Stewart leads Idaho with 83 points in 66 games...Dan Shermerhorn's six game-winning goals are second most in the WCHL this season.

Long Beach (40-23-1, 81 PTS, Second Place, Southern)...The Ice Dogs won four games last week and have won 15 of their last 17 games...Long Beach trails San Diego by eight points in the Southern Division with eight games remaining...Long Beach has outscored their opponents 88-55 in the third period of games this season...The team's defense is allowing a league-best 2.69 goals per game...Tomas Hradecky netted a hat trick in Wednesday's 8-5 win over Anchorage...The Ice Dogs have won nine straight games at home.

San Diego (43-19-3, 89 PTS, First Place, Southern)...San Diego improved their winning streak to five games and reduced their magic number for clinching the Southern Division to five...Mark Woolf is within one goal of reaching the 50-goal plateau for the third time in his career and second in three seasons...John Spoltore has a point in 10 consecutive games and leads the WCHL with 99 points, 73 on assists...Trevor Koenig leads WCHL goaltenders with 38 victories. He is also tops in minutes (3,321) and saves (1,579).

Tacoma (27-31-6, 60 PTS, Third Place, Northern)...The Sabercats lost four consecutive games on the road last week and have now lost five straight...Tacoma returns home for four games this week against the Southern Division's top two teams San Diego (2) and Long Beach (2)...The Sabercats have three players who have scored more than 25 goals: Marty Flichel (27), Dampy Brar (26) and Clayton Read (25).

WCHL QUOTE OF THE WEEK

"What's remarkable is that after our bad start, the fans kept filling the building. They've had more patience than you could ask. I don't know if I would have kept going to games.'"

Fresno Falcons forward Kris Porter on the loyal Fresno fans.

West Coast Hockey League Stories from March 25, 2002

• Gulls make cup race intriguing - WCHL
• Gold Kings look to regroup - Colorado Gold Kings

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