The Minnesota Whitecaps have played in the semifinals in each of their first four Premier Hockey Federation seasons and are on the cusp of clinching a berth in the league’s final four a fifth-straight year.
The 2019 Isobel Cup champions currently rank third in the league’s overall standings and will surely get a taste of playoff-type hockey over the schedule’s final three weekends where they’re matched up at home against second place Toronto, then in Boston to face the first place Pride, and back home where they’ll wrap up the 2022-23 campaign against fourth place Connecticut.
Sidney Morin would have it no other way.
“Our focus right now is to get one more win to keep our fate in our own hands so that we don’t have to rely on other teams,” said Morin. “Clinching in the top four would be fantastic. We’re trying not to look too far ahead but just play every game like a playoff game. Any of those teams could be our opponent in the playoffs which sets us up for success moving into the postseason because we’re going to be playing at a high level against good teams and have to make sure we’re playing the right way.”
Playing the right way starts by rebounding from a pair of home losses to Buffalo that snapped the team’s record six-game winning-streak. The Whitecaps now take on T6 for the first time since two one-goal losses north of the border on opening weekend, beginning with a 3-2 overtime loss where Morin scored Minnesota’s first goal of the season in her PHF debut.
“We played them our very first two games of the season and I think we’re a completely different team now than we were then,” she said. “We had probably half our team brand new to the PHF when we first played them and had some wide eyes at the time. Being more comfortable playing with one another has gotten a lot better as the season has come along. They’re obviously a terrific team with a great goaltender and high scoring offense so it’ll definitely be a challenge for us with a playoff feel.”
The All-Star defender is a Whitecaps alternate captain and one of 11 players adjusting to new teammates and life in their first PHF season. The team started the campaign with four-straight losses then won 10 of their next 12 including six-straight on the road to start 2023. The travel schedule provided time to bond and created a memorable stretch that Morin believes helped turn the tide.
“We had a pretty long Christmas break where we got to recharge the batteries and…
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