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Tuesday, 1 April 2025

Long battle ahead? – Raiders, Oil Kings delivering solid post-season fight

Daxon Rudolph, left, and Marshall Finnie have battled.
So far, the Prince Albert Raiders and Edmonton Oil Kings are delivering your typical solid post-season series.

After two games, the series shows the potential of possibly being a longer one, which has been rare in recent WHL post-seasons. In 2023, only two of the eight best-of-seven first round series went past five games with four of those sets being sweeps. In 2024, only one of the eight first round series went past five games and there were also four series sweeps.

In this year’s battle between the Raiders and Oil Kings, a split of the first two games is a fair result for both teams. The Oil Kings claimed Game 1 this past Friday at the Art Hauser Centre 3-1 with an empty-net goal.

Edmonton held a 40-32 edge in shots on goal, but the Raiders left that contest with a feeling of what might have been. There were times in that contest it seemed like nerves of playing the first game of the post-season might have gotten to the Prince Albert side.

This column of mine appeared in the Prince Albert Daily Herald. To read the full article, feel free to click right here.