Tonight marks night 1 of the quest for the Memorial Cup for the Calgary Hitmen, the number 1 team in the Canadian Hockey League.  After an incredible regular season, the Hitmen open the WHL postseason tonight against the Edmonton Oil Kings on The FAN 960 (7 pm puckdrop, 6 pm pregame).

It’s a matchup that clearly favors the Hitmen, as Edmonton had to win a 1 game playoff on Tuesday night just to qualify for the second season.  In that game, the Oil Kings beat Prince Albert 2-1 in overtime.  Edmonton finished 29-34-4-5 with 67 points to get the 8th and final playoff spot in the Eastern Conference.  Calgary went 59-9-3-1 and almost doubled Edmonton’s point total; Calgary finished with 122 points.

With a ton of all stars and potential award winners, the Calgary Hitmen are clearly stacked, and the regular season results speak for themselves.  The Hitmen were the number 1 scoring team in the WHL, with 330 goals; they were 1 of 2 teams in the WHL to score over 300 goals.  The Hitmen averaged 4.6 goals per game and scored 6 or more goals 27 times this season.  As for Edmonton, they were 18th of 22 teams scoring 191 goals during the regular season.  They are the second lowest scoring playoff team, and the lowest scoring team in the Eastern Conference.

On the other side of the puck, Edmonton wasn’t great either.  With 252 goals against, they only posted 3 shutouts this season, and clearly rely on goaltender Torrie Jung.  Jung posted all of his team’s shutouts, and was in net for every game when the Oil Kings allowed just 1 goal.  Since taking over in late October, Jung played 48 of the final 57 games for the Oil Kings; he was 20-20-3-5.  The Oil Kings were 5-9-1 before he took over.

The Hitmen allowed just 159 goals during the regular season, which was 3rd best in the WHL.  Only Spokane and Vancouver allowed fewer goals.  25 times this season, the Hitmen held their opponent to 1 goal or less, including 7 shutouts.  Martin Jones became one of the WHL’s best goaltenders, posting a stellar 45-5-3-1 record.  His 2.08 GAA was 3rd best in the WHL as was his .933 SP%.

Calgary finished 5-1 against Edmonton during the regular season, winning the final 5 games by a combined score of 28-7.  Brett Sonne and Paul Postma each had 10 points during the season series.  The Hitmen play game 2 of the series on Sunday afternoon on The FAN (2 pm) before shifting to Edmonton for games 3 and 4 at Rexall Place on FAN960.com.

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