EVERETT – The Everett Silvertips have piled up the accolades this season.
U.S. Division champions? Check.
Best record in the Western Conference? Check.
And now they’ve added the Western Hockey League regular season title – the Scott Munro Trophy – to the list, having clinched that over the weekend.
But while accolades are nice, the Silvertips have their focus on loftier goals.
“It’s a reward for all the hard work, it’s definitely a feather in our cap,” alternate captain Jonathan Harty said about clinching the regular season title.
“But that was probably the least important of our worries,” Harty added. “We wanted to win the division and make the Memorial Cup. Through the course of the year this one came within reach, so we took advantage of it and went for it.”
The Tips assured themselves the regular season title with their 3-0 victory at Portland last Friday. As a result, Everett will have home-ice advantage throughout the playoffs.
Medicine Hat can still match Everett’s 109 points, should the Tigers win their final two games and the Tips lose their final three in regulation. However, Everett has the edge on the tiebreakers. The first tiebreaker is total wins, and in that scenario the teams would again be tied. The second tiebreaker is head-to-head results, and Everett beat Medicine Hat 3-1 when the teams met earlier in the season. Therefore, the Tips are assured another banner to go along with its division-title banner.
“It’s still way less important than what we’ve got coming up,” Everett coach Kevin Constantine said. “But nonetheless I’m really happy for our guys. Only one team out of 21 gets to lay that claim and there’s a lot of work that goes into it. So I’m really happy the guys get to hang a minimum of two banners this year.”
Having now accomplished everything possible during the regular season, the Tips plan to take things a little easier during the final week. Everett suffered its worst rash of injuries this season in recent weeks. Therefore, the Tips plan to use this week to give players a chance to heal.
Everett has already been giving players the occasional night off. The Tips had five regulars missing from Saturday’s 5-3 loss at Tri-City, including star center Peter Mueller and leading goal scorer Moises Gutierrez, then had two others shut down during the game.
Expect that trend to continue tonight when the Tips host Prince George at 7:05 p.m. Only two players – left wing Brennan Sonne (spleen) and defenseman Taylor Ellington (neck) – remain too injured to participate if needed. But Constantine decided it’s more important for the Tips to get as healthy as possible for the playoffs, rather than trying to maintain everyone’s game sharpness.
“I think the priority is rest and health,” Constantine said. “We’re going to have a week off any way you look at it. There’s going to be a degree of rust on your game no matter what, and I’m not sure a week-and-a-half of rust is worse than a week of rust. I think you’d trade that for getting rid of some bumps and bruises and getting re-energized, both physically and mentally.”
But while getting healthy may be the top priority, it doesn’t mean the Tips plan on coasting through the final three games.
“They’re more important than you think,” captain Jason Fransoo said. “You want to have good habits going into the playoffs, you don’t want to play these games and create bad habits. I’m sure we’ll put a few younger guys in the lineup, but you want to have your game going every game. You don’t want to slack.
“Any time you put on your equipment you want to win,” Fransoo added “We might not have our strongest lineup in there player wise, but the guys who are in are definitely going to be playing their A games.”
Slap shots: Sonne is back participating in practices, though not at full speed. He won’t play in this week’s games, but Constantine said there was a good chance he’d be ready for the start of the playoffs. Constantine was less optimistic about Ellington, saying it was questionable whether he’d be ready by the start of the first round. … Tyler Eskesen is scheduled to rejoin the team today. The 1990-born forward appeared in one game when called up earlier this month. … Playoff ticket packages and single-game tickets for the first two games on March 23 and 24 are now available. Twelve-game packages can be purchased at the Silvertips office and single-game tickets are available at the Everett Events Center box office.
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