Jefferson Hagen
MacEwan Athletics
EDMONTON – It would be easy to write off the MacEwan Griffins' playoff chances if you cast a cursory glance at the Canada West women's hockey standings.
They have 10 (!) points to make up with eight games left.
However, if you consider the Griffins (5-14-1) have two games in hand on the sixth-place Trinity Western Spartans (9-10-3) and play against them twice this weekend, a potential eight-point swing is on the table.
MacEwan heads to Langley, B.C. for games at TWU on Friday (8:15 p.m. MT) and Saturday (3 p.m. MT, both Canada West TV).
"At the end of the day, mathematically we're still in the race, but we need to focus on what we need to accomplish," acknowledged Griffins interim head coach Chris Leeming. "There are a lot of things in play that could work against us, but we can't control those things. It's just being focused on our process and our day-to-day execution of things. That's where our mindset is.
"If we start worrying about things that are out of our control, our focus and energy will be directed in the wrong place."
One of those out-of-control factors is Manitoba (10-10-0), who sit between TWU and MacEwan in the standings and are in much better shape to potentially challenge for the top six than the Griffins are. Like the Griffins, the Bisons have eight games remaining in the regular season.
Regardless of what happens in the end, though, the Griffins are still in the conversation because of two huge weekend wins over Regina (3-1 and 3-0 on Friday and Saturday).
"Throughout the week, we've had a little more enthusiasm for what we've done because it's always nice to get a couple wins," said Leeming.
"Overall, we finally started getting rewarded for some of our offensive generation."
That part of the Griffins' game has been building over the past few weeks, but the pucks just weren't going in the net. Now they are.
Adding to the wave of confidence they're riding, the Griffins have previous success against the Spartans to rely on; they took three of a possible four points against them in Nov. 4-5 meetings at the Downtown Community Arena.
"Last time Trinity was in town, we split with them, so they're definitely a team we can compete with," said Leeming. "(We want to keep) building off of what we've talked about – just having second and third efforts on plays and just being disciplined with our structure. We need to continue to get pucks and bodies to the net to create secondary opportunities."
