S94 VHL Playoffs are underway!!

[DarkSpyro 939]

The 1st round of the S94 playoffs are underway now that we have our wild card round decided. The Vancouver Wolves pulled off an impressive reverse sweep against the NY Americans in a close series that went right to the very end. Wolves net-minder Dalkr Vidarsson stole the show and really kept Vancouver in it. Excited to see how they continues to elevate their game against star goaltender Joel Castle and his S94 Victory Cup winning Toronto Legion team in the real first round of the playoffs. The Legion have a lot of firepower upfront to go with their solid defence and all-star goaltending. Even with all of that said, I do think this Toronto vs Vancouver series should be great across the board and I’m personally hyped for this goalie battle! 

 

The Seattle Bears vs the Chicago Phoenix should be an interesting match-up for the 1st round as well. Even though the Seattle Bears ran with a 1-A / 1-B goalie tandem of Rask/ Costanzov this season, I do think Seattle will start Fuuka Rask as he is an incredible goaltender and playoff performer— if he plays like I think he will, then the Chicago Phoenix could be in store for a very tough series. 

 

Over in the EU division, we seen an incredible 70+ save performance from Lachlan Summers to give Warsaw a fighting chance. Sadly the Warsaw Predators would eventually fall to the Moscow Menace in a 3-1 best-of-5 series loss. Despite this sad ending for the legendary goaltender, Summers can be proud going into retirement (and most definitely the HoF) knowing that they were 1 of the best goalies the VHL has ever seen. As for the Moscow Menace; they have another tough opponent ahead of them in the London United. I’m curious to see if the Menace can keep their momentum going into the first set of games against another of the VHL’s top goalies: London United’s Merome Dilson. This could prove to be an incredible opportunity for Moscow’s Olober Syko to emerge as a superstar goaltender if they can manage to beat 2 all-time greats like Summers and Dilson out of the playoffs.

 

The Malmo Nighthawks and Riga Reign series is something I don’t want to talk about and would rather just see happen. It should be a great series— fuelled with passion and electricity as the Nighthawks look fired up to take on anyone on their path to victory. The Reign are a fairly strong team that had a slight winning record over Malmo during the regular season in several close games. I’m certain they are just as fired up too and I think the matchup could come down to the battle between the pipes. Ash Sparks, the Nighthawks goaltender and Captain, has made franchise history for the regular season for Wins (226) and shutouts (30) this past season. He is certainly looking to finish his career strong these playoffs and get his team a championship before he retires. I personally think that Red Panda and Ash Sparks are 2 elite goaltenders, and their stats vs each other this season is further proof of this. Red Panda had a crazy good 0.932 save% while facing an average of 36 shots per game against the Nighthawks in S94– and the Malmo Nighthawks Captain Ash Sparks had a whooping 0.941 save% while facing over 40 shots per game against the Riga Reign in S94. Riga’s Red Panda vs Malmo’s Ash Sparks could end up being a contest with some of the craziest highlight reel saves. A lot of goalies league-wide will be watching this series alongside side the Toronto vs Vancouver series very closely.

 

 

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Edited July 9 by DarkSpyro
edited some typos