(the university) Battle of Alberta

The University of Alberta Golden Bears face-off against their arch nemesis Mount Royal University Cougars in Canada West semi-final playoff action Friday at the Clare Drake Arena. Make no mistake, this is the university version of the “Battle of Alberta” (do I owe the Oilers a quarter now?). Alberta narrowly pushed the Cougars into 3rd place in the final Canada West standings with a two game series sweep on the final weekend of the regular season. By sweeping the Cougars and finishing in second, the Golden Bears earned themselves a bye in the first round.

All three games of the best of three series will be played this weekend at the Clare Drake starting on Friday night. The Friday start time is 7pm while the Saturday and Sunday (if needed) games have 6:00pm start times.

Make no mistake, these games will not be a walk in the park for the Golden Bears. Saskatchewan (3rd), Alberta (4th), and Mount Royal (9th) were the only Canada West teams to be ranked nationally in the top-10 and, as mentioned above, Alberta finished just ahead of Mount Royal in the regular season.

The Bears will be facing the second leading scorer in the Canada West and Tyler Fiddler will be looking to increase his scoring pace from the goal and assist he put up in two games of the Cougars quarter-final series against the doormats from UBC. Alberta’s Jordan Hickmott finished just behind Fiddler in league scoring and will look to form a balanced attack with Levko Koper, Kruise Reddick, and Stephane Legault, who all finished in the top ten of Canada West scoring.

This will also be one of the last chance’s fans of the Golden Bears will have to see the top line of Koper, Reddick, and Hickmott. All three are seniors and with the playoff starting for the Bears this weekend, it will begin their last stretch of games donning the green and gold.

Unfortunately for me, I won’t be at the Clare Drake on Friday night as I’ll be attending the Oilers Rig Live for MS event at On the Rocks. Instead of watching playoff hockey featuring a local team, I’ll have to endure an Oilers game. However, the money raised goes to support the Multiple Sclerosis Society of Canada and, thankfully, the Bears play again on Saturday night (and possibly Sunday). However, the Oilers Rig crew will be raffling off some pretty sweet items, including some signed Oilers jerseys. If I win one to replace my Hemsky jersey it may not turn out all that bad. If you are interested in coming to the event, you can buy tickets here.

Go Bears!