The Anaheim Outlaws hobbled to the finish line after some trades at the deadline and a young core finding its identity. As a result, they'll be the #7 seed and will take on the 10th-ranked SMJHL team, the Quebec City Citadelles.

Even though these teams are closely seeded, to say that there's a heated rivalry in play here would be pretty melodramatic. The 'Delles stole the 2nd game of 4 total regular season matchups at home against the Outlaws in a shootout. Ryan Riely, in his first ever shootout appearance, put one past Borro. Other than that, the Outlaws have won with relative ease in the other 3 games.

The caveat here is that most of these matchups were already played before Anaheim's biggest names were moved in exchange for future picks. It's not that the Outlaws have really been struggling so much as they're still identifying the key players on both sides of the ice. "Long" John Donair, who is among the top in rookie scoring and picked up quite a few points down the stretch, will be looked to as an offensive leader, hopefully ahead of some great goaltending and satisfactory defense.