Blades, Warriors prepare for first all Sask. conference final in 31 years

For the first time since 1993 two Saskatchewan teams will face each other in the Western Hockey League’s (WHL) Eastern Conference Final as the Moose Jaw Warriors and Saskatoon Blades get their third round series underway Friday night at SaskTel Centre.

“It’s been awhile since that’s happened so I think everybody’s excited about that. They’re a pretty big rival of our so they’re going to be ready to go,” Warriors defenceman Denton Mateychuk said.

Mateychuk currently leads the postseason in points with 19.

“I feel like I’ve been playing some good hockey through the first two rounds and just going to try and keep that going in this third series,” Mateychuk said.

Head coach, Mark O’Leary, was excited to brag about his defenceman.

“He’s been our best player. I think he’s the captain for a reason. I never get tired of talking about Denton. The way he carries himself on and off the ice, the compete the level he brings, we’ve seen that here in the first two rounds,” said O’Leary.

The Warriors will need that competitive edge from the entire team as they face a Saskatoon Blades team who were at the top of the entire WHL during the regular season. The Blades ended the regular season with 105 points. The Warriors finished 14 points behind them with 91.

“We’ve got an unbelievable team. There’s guys on our team that aren’t these point per game guys. They just play the right way and I think that’s where we have the advantage in this series is our full team,” Blades forward, Fraser Minten said.

The two teams split their season series with each winning three games a piece.

Both teams expect it to be their toughest challenge of the playoffs thus far.

“If you look at the goaltending, the defence, the forwards, there’s a lot of similarities. Two really good teams,” O’Leary said.

“Throughout the lineup we have very even players from the top guys, to the bottom guys, to the goaltending. It’s pretty similar and should be a good series,” Warriors forward Jagger Firkus added.

Firkus currently sits second in points this playoffs behind his teammate Mateychuk with 18.

The Warriors swept the Brandon Wheat Kings in the first round. Then went on to win their series against the Swift Current Broncos, 4-1, in round two. The Blades took out the Prince Albert Raiders in round one, 4-1. Then swept the Red Deer Rebels in round two.

Last year the Blades rallied from a 3-0 deficit against the Rebels to complete a reverse sweep for only the third time in WHL history on route to the Eastern Conference final where they ended up losing to the then, Winnipeg Ice.

In their second consecutive conference final they are happy to have gotten here in less games this time around. As they also had a seven game series in round one against the Regina Pats to open the playoffs in 2023.

“We talked about last year, playing two seven game series, we were pretty worn out against a really good team in Winnipeg. This year we accomplished our goals of getting the series done as quickly as we could. We got as much rest as we could and we’re ready to go,” Blades’ captain, Trevor Wong said.

The series will also see brothers, Rowan and Atley Calvert, go head to head. Rowan plays for the Blades and Atley for their hometown Warriors.

• Download the CTV News app for Sask. related breaking news alerts on your smartphone

“I was talking to my dad and he said they won’t be cheering too loud for either team. I mean if one of us scores they’ll be pretty excited. I think they’re just pretty excited at this stage and it’s really cool. I mean him [Atley] being two years older than me, we were always in different age groups so we haven’t really gotten to play against each other,” Rowan shared.

This will be the first series in 2024 where the Warriors do not have home ice advantage, but the team is looking forward to playing in front of what is expected to be a large away crowd at SaskTel Centre for games one and two.

“We get to go to SaskTel [Centre], it’s going to be electric in there. So we’re excited,” said Firkus.

The Blades are also ecstatic to have their building packed for another round of home ice.

“It’s huge for us. Just to know that support around us in the city is so high. I think last year was kind of our first taste of it. All the noise for us is really really cool,” Minten said.

In the western final it will be the Portland Winterhawks and Prince George Cougars vying for a spot in the WHL final.

The last time two Saskatchewan teams met in the eastern division final was in 1993 when the Regina Pats and Swift Current Broncos went head to head.

The Broncos eventually went on to win the championship. Something that neither the Moose Jaw Warriors nor Saskatoon Blades have ever done. However the Blades have been league runner ups on five occasions.

The last time the Warriors were Eastern Conference Champions was 2006, for the Blades it was 1994.

“Feels good to get the banners we got in the regular season but to have a playoff banner is pretty cool. So everything is amplified. There’s only two teams left in our conference so win this one and you get a ticket to the dance,” Wong said.

Puck drop for game one is at 7 p.m. Friday night with game two set for Saturday night.