Their opening-round series of the Western Hockey League playoffs may have switched to the southern local of Enmax Centre, but the result was the same as the Edmonton Oil Kings captured their third win in as many games on the strength of a 4-1 victory over the Lethbridge Hurricanes on Tuesday.
That gives Edmonton a 3-0 series lead as the host Hurricanes are now in danger of being swept from their post-season path almost as soon as the journey began.
Edmonton’s playoff road map, meanwhile, has had an X squarely marked on the Memorial Cup tournament in St. John, N.B. And their initial steps have been going according to plan, so far.
“Obviously, we did a job of getting the first two wins and then things shift on the road. Their mindset changes and they want to turn things into a home-and-home series so we knew we were going to get a good push from them tonight,” Oil Kings head coach Brad Lauer said of the Hurricanes. “I really thought our guys were ready for it at the beginning of the game and we maintained the level of play, which is what we needed to do.”
