Four points.
Going into the second-last week of regular season play, that's the margin between playoffs and an early exit for the Portage College Voyageurs.
The top six teams go through to the Alberta Colleges Athletics Conference playoffs that begin at the end of February. Portage is currently sitting in the league's bottom spot, four points back of sixth place Concordia — who they play this coming weekend.
The Voyageurs played NAIT last weekend, splitting the home-and-home series, winning on Ooks ice in Edmonton on Friday night 8-5, but losing at the Bold Center in Saturday's rematch 4-3. Saturday's game was a nail-biter, with both teams dead-locked at three going into the third period. Portage fought through four early short-handed shifts in the first five minutes of the period, including a tiring 5 on 3 defence with Voyageurs Liam Visram and Brady Stange serving separate minor penalties. The Ooks game-winner came at the halfway point of the final frame, on a bad puck bounce behind the Voyageurs' net that tricked Portage netminder Alex Brousseau, and gave Ooks forward Eric Lacombe an open-net gift. The Voyageurs pored on the pressure in the final minutes, pulling Brousseau with 90 seconds to play, but couldn't tie the score.
Chances
They were fighting for every point, said Voyageurs head coach Kevin McClelland in an interview for the ACAC website after Saturday's loss
"Tonight was a huge game for us," said McClelland. "We should've at least got a point, maybe two but we didn't so now we've just got to go take care of things one game at a time."
That next game — the first of the final four in the regular season — is back on Bold Center ice this Friday (Feb. 10) at 8 pm when the Voyageurs face the Concordia Thunder. The Voyageurs finish up the double-header against the Thunder on Saturday night in Edmonton.
Going into Friday's game, Concordia has lost three of their last three games, keeping their points total for the year at 15. The Voyageurs earned two points for their Friday night win against NAIT, giving them 11 points going into Friday's match-up. Two wins for the Voyageurs on the weekend would put them in a tie with Concordia for the final playoff spot.
The Voyageurs final regular season games are on the Feb 24 weekend when they face-off with Briercrest College, the league's current fifth place team. Concordia's final games of the season are against Augustana, the league's current third place team.
