Written by Ryan Young The Record (In paper Jan 29th)
If you're wondering just how dominant the Waterloo Wolves triple-A minor midget team has been this season, you can look at either the Alliance Hockey regular season standings or the league's individual scoring leaders.
That's because Waterloo, which earned a first round playoff bye after finishing first in the Alliance with a 23-5-4 record, also boasts the league's three leading point scorers – and by a long shot.
Right winger Chase Campbell (32 goals, 72 points), centre Brendan Schneider (20 goals, 60 points), and left winger Boris Katchouk (25 goals, 58 points) have developed into the league's most potent forward line. Each member of the trio finished at least 18 points ahead of the fourth place finisher in the league scoring race this season.
With that kind of firepower, it's no surprise Waterloo led the league in scoring with an average of 3.81 goals per game. What is surprising is that the team has held opponents to a league best 1.66 goals allowed per game.
Head coach Shawn Dietrich attributes team's defensive prowess to its mental approach to the game.
"Our goal is to never get outworked," he says. "If we can go into games and work harder than the other team, our skill level is high enough that we usually come out on the right side of things."
That team first mentality has struck a chord with everyone in the dressing room, including the top line.
"Defence comes first before offence," Katchouk says. "If we see an opportunity to score we'll take it but it starts with taking care of our own end."
Katchouk, Campbell and Schneider, who are each 15, have played together for Waterloo in the past, but this has been their first full season as a line combination. Dietrich tried the unit out in training camp and hasn't had any reason to break up the line.
Their familiarity with one another has a played a huge role in their success, according to Campbell. "Our chemistry is amazing," he says. "That's a big part of us. We're like brothers on and off the ice."
Waterloo's first round bye has kept the team off the ice, or from playing games at least, since Jan. 14, when it won its fourth game in six days to capture the Alliance regular season title by one point over London.
The team is still awaiting its opponent for its quarter-final series; it most likely will play Elgin Middlesex (13-14-5) or Chatham-Kent (12-13-7).
Dietrich has had good and bad experiences with lengthy breaks between games, but he feels this team needed the time to get healthy after already playing more than 60 games this season. He knows Waterloo needs to be healthy and have everyone playing well if it wishes to reach its ultimate goal – winning the OHL Cup.
"As much as we have those three guys leading the league in scoring, we pride ourselves on coming at teams with our depth, three solid lines," Dietrich says. "If you try to shut down one line, there's two more and six defencemen who are going to bring it as well."
Elsewhere around the league, Cambridge (9-19-4) has been eliminated from the playoffs after falling to Brantford (10-13-9) three-games-to-one in a preliminary series.
Kitchener (13-13-6) is still very much alive after sweeping Hamilton (3-26-3) three straight games in their opening round series.
The Jr. Rangers won each contest by at least five goals with Owen Lane (six goals, two assists) and Jason Willms (five goals, two assists) leading the way.
Hamilton and its league worst record may not have been the stiffest test out of the gate for Kitchener, but head coach Dean DeSilva was happy with his team's start.
"A lot can happen in the playoffs," DeSilva says. "We're not a fancy team but we certainly work hard and make other teams earn their points against us which I'd like to see continue."
Next up for Kitchener is a quarter-final matchup against the Lambton Jr. Sting (14-13-5).
DeSilva says the two teams play similar systems and are both physical, so the deciding factor should be who be executes better and stays disciplined.
"We're a meat and potatoes team," DeSilva says. "We may not be stacked with individual talent but where we find success is with our work ethic and team play . . . We have to play as a team to have success and our players have bought into that."
Kitchener opens its series against Lambton on home ice at the Activa Sportsplex with a 5 p.m. puck drop on Saturday.
Ryan Young's column appears on Wednesdays. He can be reached at [email protected] .