The Winterhawks came out and played their two best first periods all season long on Friday and Saturday, and the strength of those starts helped propel them past Edmonton 5-2 on Friday, and beat division rival Tri-City 8-2 on Saturday. There has been a lot of discussion on message boards and other blogs about the starts of the Winterhawks, in particular during their "slump" in December and January. As Samantha Meese wrote on her blog on Oregonlive, the Hawks make it a goal every night to generate 10 shots in the first 10 minutes. Friday night the Hawks were opportunistic in their capitalizing on chances, scoring 3 goals on 11 shots. Saturday the Hawks jumped on Tri-City quickly, leading to a 4-1 lead at the end of the first period.
The Hawks have shown an ability all season long to generate beautiful passing plays to move defense and goaltenders of the opposition side-to-side. When the Hawks are on their game passing, they can generate goals in this manner. However, when the Hawks had trouble in the middle part of the season executing these plays, they struggled to generate the "garbage goals". There was plenty of garbage goals this past weekend, which was oh so sweet for the Hawks. The Hawks scored 13 goals this weekend. Excluding the two empty net goals, the Hawks scored 5 of their 11 goals on rebounds, deflections, or screens. These are the type of "garbage goals" that teams thrive upon. The traffic generated in front of opposition goaltenders is crucial, in particular down the stretch versus the good goaltenders in the U.S. division.
Looking to tonight's matchup against Spokane, the Hawks have yet another "4-point" game. Spokane has cooled off from their blistering pace slightly since the injury of their starting netminder James Reid, going 3-2-0-0 since the injury occurred. Both losses came against the Tri-City Americans. The Winterhawks have had success in Spokane over the last two seasons, having only lost one game in Spokane since the start of last season. The Chiefs are led offensively by Tyler Johnson, who is second in the WHL with 86 points in 51 games. Portland will have to focus on shutting down the Johnson line tonight like they did on Saturday against the Tri-City line of Brendan Shinnimin-Adam Hughesman-Carter Ashton. However, this will be more difficult as the Hawks will not have last change like they did on Saturday night as the home team. Just an example of why teams fight so hard for home-ice advantage throughout the playoffs. With the Hawks unable to get the matchups from the faceoffs, we may see head coach Mike Johnston attempt to do some quick changing through the gameplay in order to get the matchups he desires. This may prove to be difficult however, as Spokane Arena has the weird long change twice rink configuration. Either way, the Winterhawks will need players to step up all through their lineup, in particular when facing the Johnson line.
Another point where the Winterhawks really excelled over the weekend was in the faceoff dot. Ryan Johanson won well over 60% of his faceoffs through the weekend, and when the Hawks win draws they get puck possession, a crucial part of their overall strategy. Look for the Hawks Craig Cunningham, Ryan Johansen, and Taylor Peters to try to match against one of the WHL's best faceoff men in Tyler Johnson tonight. When the Hawks win over 50% of faceoffs, particularly if they win over 50% of defensive zone draws, it limits opposition scoring chances and time on attack. And the less time the Hawks spend in their own zone, the more opportunities for the skill players to establish an offensive zone presence.
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