‘That’s why we play the game’: Blazers looking forward to Game 7 with chance to advance to WHL Final

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The Blazers are playing their first seventh and deciding game since losing in overtime to Kelowna in 2016. According to the team, Kamloops has lost its last three Game 7s — all on the road.

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The last Game 7 in Kamloops was in 1994 to decide the Western Hockey League championship. It was the Blazers and Saskatoon Blades, and the home team won decisively 8-1 at the Riverside Coliseum.

The Blazers are ready to play in front of their home crowd and use that energy in their favour. The game can go either way. It’s been a close series with Kamloops and Seattle alternating wins to get to Game 7.

“It’s been a really great series,” said Blazers head coach Shaun Clouston. “I think it’s been hard-fought, it’s been physical, it’s been fast. Both teams checking really hard. There’s not a real big numbers of opportunities, so you have to play hard, you have to be patient, you have to be willing to battle for ice.”

Many of the Blazers are in their first playoff, not to mention a Game 7. Clouston says it’s important keep doing what got the team to the conference final.

“I think it’s commit to the process. I think there’s structure to what we do in our preparation and there’s structure to what we do in our warm-up and then go out and execute the game plan,” he said. “Play your best. You can’t ask for anything more than that. It’s a team effort. It’s a committment. It’s just play your best.”

The Blazers feel they need to use their speed to their advantage and fire pucks at Thomas Milic if they hope to move on to their first WHL Final since 1999 when they lost to Calgary.

“We like to think we’re a faster team than they are. In those three wins, that really showed the way we play, especially through the neutral zone and the offensive zone. We play fast,” said Garand. “A big thing for us is shots on net. In a couple wins, we had a good shooting mentality and a lot of chances around the net, so I think we just got to keep that up.”

Toporowski added, “It’s going to be a tight game, just like the past few games have been. It’s been in overtime, been low scoring, it’s going to be a tight game. It’s going to be whoever wants it more is going to get the win.”