Jr. Blues face Topeka in pivitol games this weekend

The Springfield Junior Blues have been playing some pretty good hockey as of late, but if this team wants to present themselves as a threat to opponents and be considered championship contenders, what happens during the two-game home stand this weekend against Topeka could determine quite a bit.

Entering Friday night's contest inside the Nelson Center, head coach Joe Dibble and his Jr. Blues will have won six of there last seven contests overall, and will be flying high with confidence. Just three weeks ago Springfield was in fourth place and five points behind Coulee Region. Now, they have 40 points and are five points ahead of Coulee Region (35 points), sitting in third place in the Midwest.

Springfield, who is sitting comfortably in a playoff spot at the moment, will play it's last two home games during the two-game stand over the weekend before hitting the road for nine straight games. The team will visit Coulee Region (2 games), Michigan (2 games), Chicago again (3 games), and Kalamazoo (2 games) before coming back home inside the Nelson Center on March 16th when they host Janesville for three contests.

Topeka presents a tough matchup, as the two teams have played six times this season with Topeka winning five of the six. The Roadrunners (30-12-2) are currently in second place in the South with 62 points overall and have outscored Springfield in the six games thus far by a total of 15-to-10, and have won both games that were played inside the Nelson Center.

With the Jr. Blues being 10-11-2 at home so far this season, winning both games would put them over the .500 mark, which would be a huge success before the road trip begins. Even though the team is comfortably locked into a playoff spot, confidence will be one of the main keys' to this team making a run. With the way that it looks for the Chicago Hitmen, this team could stumble quite a bit down the stretch and still make it safely into the playoffs, which is certainly not something that this team wants to do.

The Blue notes have an excellent offensive attack, which is led by possibly the best trio of forwards in the entire North American Hockey League--Kyle Cook, Chris Sitler, and Josef Pontasch. All three players have atleast 39 points so far this season--and Cook leads the team with 22 goals through 42 games.

The team hasn't been healthy and on the ice together as a complete team for very long yet--but it is slowly but surely starting to happen. The team is finally getting to play together and the chemistry is most certainly starting to look a lot better already. Just imagine if they can stay healthy and continue to gain more and more confidence until playoff time? That is most certainly a question that only time will answer. But the run that this team made under Dibble last season is something most people still remember.

The return and production from Mike Williams (22 pts) has intstantly helped make an immediate impact to the offense as he has scored thirteen goals and added in nine assists. Also, Gavin Tufte and Ethan Nauman present a tough combo for any opponent when they are on as they have combined to tally 64 points between the two (32 pts each).

As for the defensive side of the puck for the Jr. Blues, both of the goalies have become pretty good for the team. With the addition of Gabe Antoni, the results have been better. Antoni and Parks both own a .915 save percentage and have been dominant between the pipes during the teams' six wins over the previous seven games.

Antoni is 5-0-1 since being a Blue Note and has allowed seventeen goals in seven starts. He started on Sunday afternoon but was pulled from the game when he allowed five goals on eighteen shots. Parks' came in in relief and pitched a shutout for the final 21 minutes and helped the team in the 6-5 win.

The team is surrounded by some very good defensemen, which helps out tremendously. Ben Kramer (5'9, 160 lbs), and Kevin Walters (5'7, 165 lbs) both are small but bring speed and quickness to help on defense while Ruslan Pedan (6'1, 185 lbs), Cody Kohn (5'10, 180 lbs), and Cody Dixon (5'11, 185) all bring some size and aggression to help protect the netminders.

Also, a huge factor for helping determine how far this team could go, is the penalty box. The Jr. Blues are first in the division in penalty minutes, which hasn't helped out much--although it penalty kill is starting to get better. If they can stay at full strength, this offense continues to become even more dangerous.

This team certainly has the potential and the ability to make this season turn into something special, but there is still a lot of business that needs to be taken care of. Winning both games this weekend against a tough opponent that has owned the team so far before a long road trip could go a long, long way. One thing that I have noticed is that winning at home gives you the confidence to go on the road and do the same thing.

Head coach Joe Dibble has a track record of being a second-half coach, and from being around the players, they all seem to have a good amount of confidence in what he says. This team did something pretty special last season, but with a little more talent in my eyes. What will this season's Springfield Junior Blues bring us? That my friends, only time will tell.