The fifth place Manitoba Bisons (regular season: 13-13-0-3; playoffs: 2-1) continue their playoff season, after a thrilling, epic conference quarter-final series win at Saskatchewan, in Canada West conference women's hockey as they now travel to the #10 and first place Alberta Pandas (15-9-1-3) to play in the Canada West Semi Final best-of-three playoff series on the February 26-28 weekend.
The best-of-three playoff series commences on Friday, February 26 with a start time of 3 p.m. CT for game one then game two on Saturday, February 27 at 2 p.m. CT and, if necessary, game three will be play on Sunday, February 28 at 2 p.m. CT. All playoff contests will be played at the Clare Drake Arena (Alberta campus) and shown on live webcast at canadwest.tv website.
During this season, Manitoba went 1-3 against Alberta as they split at home (W 2-1 on Oct. 3/15; L 4-0 on Oct. 4/15) and were swept on the road (L 2-0 on Jan. 8/16; L 3-0 on Jan. 9/16). Since the beginning of the second half of the 2015-16 season, the Bisons went 4-7-0-1 in reg. season and won three of last four games away plus two of three on the road in the playoffs so far.
The last time both teams meet in the playoffs was in the 2014-15 season in the conference final and Alberta swept Manitoba in Edmonton by a 2-0 game margin (L 4-0 and L 3-1) in the best-of-three series. This is the ninth time that both teams meet-up in post-season series action since women's hockey started play in Canada West during the 1997-98 season. Manitoba has met Alberta in every playoff occasion on the road and every playoff series was in the Canada West Championship and hold a 2-6 post-season record with series wins in 2009 (2-1 in games) and 2011 (2-0 in games) while the rest of the results have fallen to the Pandas with 2-0 series victories in 2005-08, 2010 and 2015.
Manitoba is looking to advance to a conference championship series in back-to-back seasons for the first time since 2009-10 and 2010-11 season.
This playoff season, the Bisons defeated Saskatchewan 2-1 in games during the conference quarterfinal series on the road on Feb. 19-21/16.
In the 2016 playoffs, Lauryn Keen leads the team with six points (two goals, four assists) followed by Alanna Sharman (1g, 4a) with five points and Venla Hovi with four points (3g, 1a). Goalie Amanda Schubert has two wins with 0.60 GAA and .978 Save Pct.
Bison women's hockey - 2016 Canada West Semi Final series away schedule
Date Game Time Place
Fri., February 26 Game 1: Manitoba at Alberta 3 p.m. CT Alberta
Sat., February 27 Game 2: Manitoba at Alberta 2 p.m. CT Alberta
*Sun., February 28 Game 3: Manitoba at Alberta 2 p.m. CT Alberta
* if necessary
Bison Notes: Last season, the Bison women's hockey team started the conference playoffs at home and went to the 2015 Canada West conference final. Since Jon Rempel became the head coach of the program in the 2004-05 season, the women's hockey team at Manitoba has made the playoffs in 11 of 12 seasons and the last four consecutive seasons.
