Goaltending Gives Vernon Huge Edge Over Wenatchee:

This was on the Morning Star website:

BCHL Today: Goaltending gives Vernon huge edge over Wenatchee

BCHL Today is a (near) daily look at what’s going on around the league and the junior A world.

Eric Welsh

Mar. 16, 20

Welcome to the March 16, 2018 edition of BCHL Today, a (near) daily look at what’s going on around the league and the junior A world.

The playoffs resume tonight, including the series I’m most interested in.

Wenatchee is in Vernon as Interior division titans clash in round two. I hitched my wagon to the Wild before the playoffs began and I’ve stucked with them so far even as a massive red flag has popped up, but let’s see if the numbers support my faith.

Hint. They won’t.

This series starts and ends with goaltending, which appears to be a colossal advantage for the Vipers. Vernon pins its hopes on the BCHL’s Goaltender of the Year, Ty Taylor, who posted a 1.87 goals-against average and .931 save percentage in 31 regular season appearances, and has posted a 1.97 GAA and .927 SP in four post-season outings.

Having a guy like that between the pipes can be a huge psychological advantage for Vernon, and get into the heads of opponents.

At the other end, Wenatchee counters with either Seth Eisele or Austin Park, and neither should instill Wild fans with confidence. Eisele was named the BCHL’s all-rookie goalie earlier this week, which speaks more to the thin field of freshman stoppers this season than anything he did. In 34 regular season appearances the 19 year old Minnesota native posted a meh 2.64 GAA and very meh .887 SP.

He started the playoffs with a 14 save shutout of Merritt in game one of their first round series, but Eisele was pulled just 5:20 into game two after giving up two goals on three shots and hasn’t been seen since. Park replaced him, playing the last three games in a four game sweep of the Centennials. The Colorado native was shaky in his first two outings (.889 and .833 save percentages) and great in the series finale, when he stopped 32 of 33 shots in a 4-1 win.

Whenever you’re faced with a blip like that, it’s always good to look at the larger sample size.

In 25 regular season games, Park had a 2.78 GAA and .887 SP, and he looked like that guy for most of the Merritt series. I wouldn’t expect him to be dialing up that .970 SP mojo too often and I can’t see Wenatchee bench boss Bliss Littler being confident in either of these guys.

If Eisele and Park struggled against Merritt’s No. 10 ranked offence, they’re likely to struggle more against Vernon’s No. 6 ranked group.

The Wild have to hope to outscore their goaltending, which brings us back around to Taylor, who will have his hands full. Wenatchee outscored, by far, any other team in the BCHL this season, averaging 4.15 goals per game (Trail’s next at 3.76). Reigning BCHL MVP Jasper Weatherby led the circuit in regular season scoring with 37 goals and 74 points in 58 games, and hasn’t slowed down a tick in the playoffs. The Washington State native sits atop the post-season scoring list with 10 points in four games.

In a down year for offence league-wide, the Wild had six players top the 50 point mark, including X-factor defenceman Cooper Zech, who finished fourth in the BCHL scoring parade with 11 goals and 69 points in 58 games. Slava Demin collected nine goals and 45 points in 57 outings, giving Wenatchee two outstanding weapons on the back end.

AJ Vanderbeck had a quiet opening round by his standards (4-1-3-4), but the Wild have guys like Sam Morton (4-0-8-8) and Lucas Sowder (4-4-1-5) to pick up the slack.

Normally I’d dive deeper with the regular season series (3-3, Vernon leading 17-12 in goals for) and all that, but I don’t feel I need to go any further.

Goaltending is so huge in the playoffs and there’s such a huge disparity. I’m bailing on the Wild and calling the Vipers in five.