Playoff push starts now for Neepawa Natives

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Published on Thursday, January 15, 2015

By Eoin Devereux

The Neepawa Banner

The next few games for the Neepawa Natives could decide whether of not the team makes a serious run for the playoffs, or whether they’re simply playing out the stretch.

The team has three games in four nights, starting on Saturday, Jan. 17, at the Yellowhead Centre against the Winnipeg Blues. 

Recently, several key members of the roster returned from injury and the club’s performance on the ice has improved because of it. Unfortunately, the OCN Blizzard and Waywayseecappo Wolverines, the two teams Neepawa has the best chance of catching in the standings, have also been able to up their level of play as well as of late.

Natives head coach Dwayne Kirkup said they have to play every remaining game of the regular season with the urgency of the playoffs.

“I think with the OCN Blizzard and Waywayseecappo Wolverines, both have become a little hot here in the last little while, I think the message we’re trying to get across to the players is that we need to break each three game segment into a playoff series. We have to win two out of three,” said Kirkup. “We need to break it down into small pieces and our playoffs are starting right now.”

Since the start of the new year, both OCN and Wayway have been able pull away from Neepawa in the standings, with some unexpected wins over top MJHL clubs, including the Steinbach Pistons and Winnipeg Blues. Kirkup said they can’t be scoreboard watching for what other teams are doing and need to remain focused on what they control.

“I think we are focused on what he have to do. We have to start winning and can’t pay attention to what other teams are doing or rely on other teams to win games that’ll help us. We need to be accountable for ourselves and simply win some hockey games,” said Kirkup. 

If Neepawa does win, it’ll be against some challenging competition as they play Winnipeg twice this month, as well as upcoming games against Steinbach, Selkirk and Waywayseecappo. Kirkup said skating against the top teams has pushed the players to greater heights.

“The better the team, the bigger the challenge, the better we’ve played this year. We have played some of the top teams in the standings much better. Whether it’s been Portage, Winkler or Winnipeg, we have played those teams tough,” noted Kirkup. “We’re healthy now. There are no more excuses. We now have to be the types of teams that finds ways to win.”

The Neepawa Natives have a pair of home games scheduled for Saturday, Jan. 20, and Sunday, Jan. 21 against Winnipeg and Selkirk respectively.