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***FuzzSHL*** · 03-11-2024, 12:49 AM

By this time next Sunday, the Challenge Cup will have been given out and the focus will have shifted towards Season 76. Right now, however, the league awaits the start of each Conference Final. In the Eastern Conference we have a rematch of last season's teams, but the Western Conference sees two teams return to the league semifinals after differing lengths of missing out. What does the model think of each matchup?

Western Conference
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The Western Conference finals gets a fresh look after a long reign of dominance from the Winnipeg Aurora and Edmonton Blizzard. This season is only the second since S70 that the Edmonton Blizzard have not been in the Conference finals, and second consecutively. With Winnipeg, it is the first season that they have not been in the Conference Finals since S68. The last time Los Angeles was in the Conference Finals was in S65 when they faced off against the Chicago Syndicate, where Los Angeles took the series in six games en route to a Challenge Cup victory over the Tampa Bay Barracuda. The last time that the Texas Renegades found themselves this deep in the playoffs was in S62, where they faced....the Los Angeles Panthers. Texas won that series in six games en route to a Challenge cup victory over the Hamilton Steelhawks. These two teams have faced long roads to get where they are today, yet neither will be happy with only making it this far. Los Angeles comes in as the hosting team having finished higher in the regular season standings, and while the model favors them with 54% odds, Renegades netminder Anthony Dionne is on a hot streak that might be unmatched in SHL history (don't quote me) having posted a sub-2.00 goals allowed average and a 0.955 save percentage through the first nine games of the playoffs with only one overtime loss to his name. Alexi Piastri (9-9-18) and Adam Prpich (5-10-15) look to break that hot streak and continue the Panthers high octane style of play that has carried them to a 21-0-1 record in their last twenty-two games, regular season included.

Game 5 Update
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Prior to the start of the series, we highlighted a few players who needed to keep showing up for both teams for either team to have a good chance at moving on to the Challenge Cup Finals. Through the first two series, Renegades netminder Anthony Dionne was rocking a 0.955 save percentage. Through the first four games of this series, however, Dionne has saved 131 of the 147 shots he has faced for a 0.891 save percentage. Mads McBride started the series on an absolute heater with a hat trick in game one, but has been silenced since. Meanwhile for the Panthers, Grzegorz Brzeczyszczykiewicz has rebounded from a poor Game 1 to collect 102 saves on 113 shots faced for a 0.903 save percentage. However, in the Panthers three wins, he has saved 80 of 85 shots faced for a 0.941 save percentage. Offseason acquisition Alexi Piastri has kept on his hot streak by notching four goals and two assists through the first four games of the series while defenseman Georg N'Zola has collected a goal, two assists, and a +4 rating. Texas will surely need both Dionne and McBride to bounce back if they have any hope of clinching a Challenge Cup birth.

Eastern Conference
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While the Western Conference sees new faces, the Eastern Conference not only finds themselves in a rematch of last year's Conference Finals, but it continues a stretch that started in S72 where these two teams have faced off against one another this deep in the playoffs. These two teams might be a bit apart in rating, but history suggests that this matchup will be much closer than the rating difference suggests. In the previous three seasons, the New England Wolfpack have the 2-1 overall series edge and a 10-9 edge in overall games won. In those three seasons, only last season did one of these teams walk away with a Challenge Cup. While New England is hoping to defend their Challenge Cup title, the Philadelphia Forge are looking to move on to the finals for the first time since S73 and win it for the first time since S69. Led by center Graj Virrok (12-10-22) and linemate Nibbles The Squirrel (10-10-20), the Forge themselves look to break a hot goalie. Olof Karsikko might go down as the best playoff goalie of all-time when all is said and done. In his fourteen year career, he has yet to miss the playoffs, having played for both the Los Angeles Panthers and New England Wolfpack. In those fourteen seasons, he has posted a sub-.900 save percentage in the playoffs only once, a S67 showing with the Panthers that saw them ousted in six games. Even then, his career save percentage in the playoffs is 0.912, a step up from his 0.904 career save percentage in the regular season. What Philadelphia will be able to pull off might not be up to them, but instead determined by arguably the best to ever do it.

Game 5 Update
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To say that this series has seen some crazy would be an understatement. As the old saying goes, "the series doesn't start until you someone loses at home." If that really is the case, this series really hasn't started yet, and the goalies got the memo. BASE PACK has stopped 95 of the 111 shots he has faced for a save percentage of 0.855, while Olof Karsikko has stopped 137 of 158 for a save percentage of 0.867. We highlighted both Graj Virrok and Nibbles The Squirrel as players to watch for Philadelphia and they have combined for eleven points in the series thus far. Virrok, who came in to the series with twelve goals in ten games has yet to score a goal for the Forge despite the Forge scoring twenty-two goals in four games. Squirrel has been the true standout for Philadelphia with two goals and five assists. For New England, former Mexico winner Ivan Lacksamus has combined with breakout star Antoine Beauregard for four goals and twelve assists, with each player having notched two goals and six assists. The series odds are fairly close to what they started with, but the deeper we go into the series the better odds New England has of upsetting the scorching hot Forge.