Abbotsford Canucks can claim Calder Cup Saturday, and that would sell hope to fans
The Abbotsford Canucks are one win away from a Calder Cup championship, and they are saying all the right things about that.
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'The message never changes us for us. Whether we win or lose, it's about the next game and that's where our focus is going to lie — bringing our best effort to the next game,' Abbotsford coach Manny Malhotra told the media after a 3-2 win over the Charlotte Checkers Thursday at the Abbotsford Centre gave them a 3-1 lead in the best-of-seven AHL championship series.
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Abbotsford can now claim the league title with a victory in Game 5 on Saturday (6 p.m.) on home ice.
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Considering how messy the Vancouver Canucks ' season was, their farm team winning a championship would help sell hope for the future to the fan base.
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A Vancouver affiliate has never captured the AHL title. The 2015 Utica Comets, led by coach Travis Green, got to the league championship series but lost. They had gotten to the second round twice in their previous seasons in Abbotsford.
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Fans at the Abbotsford Centre on Thursday night began chanting 'We want the Cup,' in the third period.
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Ticketmaster is listing the Saturday's game as a sell-out. There were standing room tickets available as of Friday morning, but they had been purchased by the afternoon. There are also tickets available at resale sites like StubHub. The games are web streamed on FloHockey but there's a subscription fee.
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Malhotra has talked up the atmosphere at the Abbotsford Centre throughout these playoffs and Thursday's crowd was announced at 7,181, which is a record for the franchise's four years there. Their announced attendance average for the regular season was 4,152.
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Charlotte (44-22-3-3) finished fourth in the league overall during the regular season, two points ahead of fifth-place Abbotsford (44-24-2-2). That gives the Checkers home ice advantage in this series, and means that if they can win Saturday then proceedings shift back to Charlotte, N.C., with a Game 6 set for Monday and a Game 7, if needed, slated for Wednesday.
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'From Day One of the season, we continuously talked about wanting to take advantage of playing on home ice,' Malhotra told reporters Thursday. 'We wanted to make the most of the three games that we're going to have here (in this series).
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'And, most importantly, it's so much fun for the guys to play in front of this crowd. The building was electric again and they definitely feed off that. It's very special for our guys to play in front of our fans and we get a big boost out of it.'
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The Abbotsford players echoed Malhotra's thoughts about staying on task. These Canucks have received a stellar effort in the playoffs from goaltender Artūrs Šilovs, but their success can be also attributed to the fact they get contributions up and down the line-up. They play well as a group. Malhotra deserves credit for creating that.
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