WESTLOCK – In their return to action after a three-year hiatus, the Westlock Junior ‘B’ Rock have reached their goal which was to make the playoffs.
The club ended their regular season at the Rotary Spirit Centre July 15 with an 11-7 loss to the Sylvan Lake Yetti and despite the defeat they earned a spot in the Rocky Mountain Lacrosse League (RMLL) postseason finishing in sixth place in Junior ‘B’ Tier 2 North Division standings at 7-9 with 14 points.
“I definitely consider this season a success. The goal was to make the playoffs and lay down some roots for the junior team,” said head coach Kyle Schram. “We’ve got a lot of 16-year-old kids and we’ve got a good program set up. I’m looking forward to having a (junior) team in town for hopefully a long time.”
Schram is back behind the bench this season, after also coaching the last junior team in Westlock back 2019. This year the Rock have 27 players, ranging in age from 17-21, while the RMLL North Division has nine teams with the Top 6 making playoffs which begins this weekend.
Each round is a best-of-three series, said Schram, adding he expects they’ll start the playoffs against the same team they finished the regular season against although the standings have yet to be confirmed. In the first round of the playoffs, the fourth and fifth placed teams will face-off, while the third and sixth placed teams will battle.
Having just played the Yetti, the Rock now know what they can expect and worked hard to “set the tone” for the playoffs.
“We want to let them know we’re not going to be (easy) just because we’re lower in standings,” said Schram. “We’re not going to let them push us around, we want to get on them quick and take it to them a bit so they don’t think they have an easy first-rounder. We’re focused on the task at hand. We’ll take it one game at a time and go from there.”
That style of physical play was one of the team’s strengths this season, as well as their defence-first attitude.
“We’re a strong defensive team. That’s kind of our game-style, defence first,” he said. “And through that we hope to generate chances offensively, that’s our strategy.”
