It’ll be the Dragons and the Camrose Kodiaks in the first round of the best-of-five play-off series for Drumheller, after coming off a 5-4 shoot-out loss to the Calgary Mustangs on Sunday afternoon.
The Kodiaks finished third in the southern division (32-22-6, 70 points), with the Dragons finishing sixth (21-31-8, 50 points).
But the revelation of their first round opponent won’t sway the team’s usual practice regime when they ready to travel to Camrose for the first two games. The Kodiaks will host the Dragons this Thursday and Friday evening at the Edgeworth Centre at 7:30 p.m.
“We’ll prepare to do our thing, play our style of hockey and make sure we can execute that as best as we can. I feel that will give us the best chance to win.”
The Dragons will be back for what could be the final round on Sunday at 2:00 p.m. at the Memorial Arena: the final round if Camrose bests them on their home ice.
Sundays 5-4 shootout loss to the Calgary Mustangs was another game with play-off feel in the week leading up to the end of the regular season.
“Whether they were at home or on the road, players and fans alike seemed to have that playoff mentality. Sunday’s game was no different.”
“We came within one post of getting the win, but it was a good win for the guys to come back from a two goal deficit.”
The Dragons were down 3-1 until early in the third when Mike Marianchuk put them within reach of tieing it at the 1:42 mark. The Mustangs responded 10 seconds later, but another goal from Marianchuk with 5 minutes left gave hope. Matthew Brown scored a nail-biting shorthanded goal with just under a minute left, his second of the night, putting the game into shootout mode.
Mustang Alexander MacMillan scored on Calgary’s second shootout attempt on Drumheller netminder Garret Beckwith. Drumheller’s Sam Lawson, Robert Geddes, and Cass Mappin failed to find the back of the net on their trys.