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Series Preview: Calgary Wranglers look to make up some ground against the Silver Knights

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Photo credit:Photo by David Moll/Calgary Wranglers
Paige Siewert
11 months ago
The Calgary Wranglers play their last two regular season home games this week before they come back for playoffs in mid-late April. They will host the Henderson Silver Knights on Wednesday evening and Friday afternoon. While they have already secured a playoff spot, these will be a big couple of games as they need to continue to make ground on clinching the division and the league. Unfortunately, this may be tough to work towards as they’ve had quite a bit of trouble against Henderson this season. 

Projected lineups

Calgary
Dryden Hunt – Ben Jones – Matthew Phillips
Emilio Pettersen – Connor Zary – Cole Schwindt
Brett Sutter – Kevin Rooney – Clark Bishop
Mitch McLain – Adam Klapka – Alex Gallant
Ilya Solovyov – Nick DeSimone
Jeremie Poirier – Colton Poolman
Nicolas Meloche – Kristians Rubins 
Dustin Wolf
Oscar Dansk
Henderson
Gage Quinney – Sakari Maninen – Sheldon Rempas
Brendan Brisson – Byron Froese – Jonas Rondbjerg
Spencer Foo – Ivan Morozov – Maxim Marushev
Jermaine Loewen – Connor Ford – Kyle Marino
Jake Bischoff – Brayden Pachal
Dysin Mayo – Daniil Miromanov
Lukas Cormier – Kaedan Korczak
Jiri Patera
Isaiah Saville

Leaders

Calgary
Matthew Phillips – 58GP, 32G, 34A
Connor Zary – 64GP, 20G, 37A
Ben Jones – 63GP, 14G, 32A
Henderson
Gage Quinney – 58GP, 23G, 29A
Gemel Smith – 50GP, 18G, 34A
Sheldon Rempal – 62GP, 21G, 29A

Notes and expectations 

The Silver Knights have been a tricky opponent for the Wranglers this season. Arguably their toughest overall. The Wranglers have only one regulation win in six match-ups with them and sit at a 1-4-1-0 record against them in their season series. Their magic number to clinch both the division and league is 17 going into this series and the team is well aware of how close Coachella Valley is behind him. Despite their Henderson troubles, they’re still keeping the big picture in mind.
Everyone has their Achilles heel and it is quite clear that the Silver Knights are it. Statistically, the Wranglers should not have this much of a problem against this team. They have almost doubled them in points on the year and their overall record put them eight places higher in the division and completely different ends of the league standings with the Wranglers in the first spot and the Silver Knights in the 31st position. 
However, since the last time these teams played, the Wranglers have added new players to their roster. Dryden Hunt and Kristians Rubins. Both have been acquainting themselves nicely with their new team. Hunt has one goal and six assists in his nine games with the Wranglers so far and slotted right in on the top line alongside Ben Jones and Matthew Phillips.
Kristians Rubins played his first two games with the Wranglers last week and earned an assist in both games. It appeared a new team was what he needed to get back on the scoresheet as he previously went 16 games without a point. He’s paired nicely with Yan Kuznetsov and Nicolas Meloche and fits right in with the defensive depth of this team. Hopefully, these additions can continue to contribute in their next pair of games.
This series kicks off on Wednesday evening with a 7:00 p.m. MT puck drop. Next up will be their final regular season home game on Friday with a 1:00 p.m. MT start. Friday’s game will reveal the long-awaited Wranglers mascot. Just in time for playoffs. Both games can be caught in person at the Scotiabank Saddledome or streamed on AHL.tv. FlamesNation contributors Mike Gould and myself will have updates on Twitter.

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