We’re a little closer to knowing the playoff picture but incredibly, the only thing that was decided this past weekend was that the Rush have clinched a home playoff game. Buffalo and Saskatchewan are now tied for first, with Buffalo holding the tiebreaker, but there are still six other teams (COL, GEO, HFX, ROC, SD, VAN) that could still finish first overall. Four more (ALB, CAL, OTT, TOR) could finish as high as third, and the Wings could finish as high as sixth. Alternatively, any of those teams except Buffalo and Saskatchewan could finish tenth or lower. For example, with only three weeks left in the regular season, the Rock could finish 3rd or 14th.

Just like last year, the playoff race could come down to the very last weekend, or even the very last game, of the season. Once again, unified standings FTW.

Awesome

Christian Del Bianco and the Warriors

Del Bianco is now 3–0 in a Warriors jersey, and has not only made a huge difference to the team’s playoff chances, but to the team’s confidence and belief in themselves. Of course, the second has a big impact on the first.

But this awesome is specifically about the last 30 seconds of the game against Buffalo. Neither Del Bianco nor Vinc started out terribly strong; the score was 2–2 after less than three minutes of play and 4–3 after less than seven. But things calmed down after that. Buffalo only scored once in the second quarter, and Vancouver only twice in the third. But in the fourth quarter, Vancouver scored four in four minutes to go from down 11–9 to up 13–11. Ian MacKay scored to get the Bandits back within one, where they stayed for the next four minutes.

Jeff Cornwall tries to stop Dhane Smith

With 36 seconds left in regulation time and the Bandits on the power play, they pulled Vinc to go 6-on–4. The four defensemen plus CDB are facing Dhane Smith, Josh Byrne, Chase Fraser, Tehoka Nanticoke, Kyle Buchanan, and Ian MacKay, possibly the best top six of any team in the league. In that thirty seconds,

• Fraser hit the post
• Buchanan took a shot, saved
• Smith took a shot, saved
• A tic-tac-toe play, saved
• A couple of other shots were not taken because the defense gave the shooter nowhere to shoot

Those saves by Del Bianco and the strong defensive play prevented the last-minute comeback by the Bandits. I don’t want to give Del Bianco all the credit since it was a team victory, but the Warriors have been up by seven or more and lost the game three times in the last three seasons. The change of coaching, additions to the defense, and the addition of Del Bianco have made it so that the defending champs couldn’t mount a two-goal comeback against the Warriors.

Saskatchewan

The Rush played pretty badly against the Thunderbirds two weeks ago, and they know it. Austin Shanks said as much in an interview during Saturday’s game. They’ve already clinched a playoff spot but they knew they had to play better if they wanted to clinch a home playoff game and head into the playoffs strong. So they did.

Frank Scigliano allowed twelve Colorado goals but the Rush were up 10–1 in the second quarter, so the outcome wasn’t really in doubt early on. He and his defense played a great game and the offense was clicking as well. That’s kind of an obvious thing to say when you put up 17 goals, but there were assists from Hossack, Barnable, Kidd, and even Scigliano, which means the transition was working as well.

Having two players on the same team each score 6+ goals in a game has only ever been done three times, but Shanks (6+4) and Keenan (5+2) were a single goal away. Ryan Lee also scored six which means that they were a goal away from the first ever NLL game to feature three sock-tricks.

Jake Naso won over 80% of his faceoffs, the Rush led the game in power play goals, loose balls, shots on goal, caused turnovers, and took fewer penalties. The only negative in this game for Saskatchewan is the four shorthanded goals they allowed the Mammoth. Three of them took place on the same minor penalty, only the second time this has happened since 2005, but allowing four shorties in one game isn’t great.

Rochester

The Knighthawks are one of the hottest teams in the league right now, having won five straight. And outside of Saturday’s game against San Diego, they’ve all been statement wins – beating Calgary by five, Albany by seven, Las Vegas by eight, and Ottawa by ten. And honestly, the win against San Diego could have been similar since Rochester was up by six early in the third, but they allowed San Diego to go on a 7–1 run in the third and fourth to tie it up. But Ryan Smith scored a huge goal with eleven seconds left to seal (pun very much intended) the win for the Knighthawks.

The goaltending situation in Rochester is a bit unusual. Rylan Hartley is the starter, and the team seems to feel more… I’m not sure what the word is here, comfortable, maybe? when Hartley is in the net. But they also have a lot of confidence in Riley Hutchcraft, who actually has slightly better numbers at this point in the season than Hartley. That might mean that the Knighthawks coaches have a shorter leash on Hartley – if he falters at all, they could pull him and put Hutchcraft in and still have the team’s full confidence. If you don’t have that confidence in your backup, you may leave the starter in as long as possible, even if he’s not having his best game, and that may put you in a hole you can’t easily dig out of.

Connor Fields is having another MVP-type season, sitting at 109 points and second in the league. But Ryan Lanchbury, who had a breakout year last season, is having another one. He’s at 103 points, tied for fourth overall. Ryan Smith is on pace for 83 points, down a bit from last year’s 99, but Thomas McConvey is already 18 points ahead of his total from last year. Smith may be down a little but everyone else is up, in some cases quite a bit.

The defense started out a bit shaky but they’ve only given up more than 13 goals once in their last nine games. They only have two games left, hosting Ottawa and Toronto. Neither will be easy but these are both very winnable games and could put the Knighthawks in a very strong playoff position.

Halifax vs. Georgia

This was an exciting game from start to finish, especially the finish. Both teams have essentially clinched a playoff spot (Georgia makes the playoffs in 90.7% of remaining scenarios, Halifax in 99.9%) but both want to host one. Brett Dobson and Warren Hill were both excellent in net, and the transition in this game was dizzying. The action was back and forth from one end of the floor to the other and back all game long.

Georgia took an early lead and held it (though never bigger than 3 goals) until 10 minutes into the second quarter, when Halifax tied it up. It was tied at 5, 6, 7, and 8 over the next fifteen minutes before the Swarm once again took a lead and held it. But the Thunderbirds did not give up and after Cody Jamieson got them back within one with only nineteen seconds left, they pulled Hill for the last possession of regulation, and Dawson Theede scored his fourth of the game with only three seconds left on the clock. After a couple of plays at each end in overtime, Andrew Kew scored his second OT winner and fourth game-winning goal of the season to send the local fans home happy and break the hearts of the Thunderbirds fans.

Kudos to the Thunderbirds for scoring those goals late and forcing overtime in the first place. And kudos to the Swarm for recovering from those last minute goals.

Not Awesome

Ottawa and Philadelphia switch positions

Earlier in the season, the Black Bears couldn’t score to save their lives. In their first twelve games, they failed to reach 10 goals eight times (though they scored 18 in Albany). In their last three, some kind of switch got flipped and they are averaging 14.3 goals per game.

Meanwhile the Wings started the season 5–2 and averaged 14.6 goals per game, but have now lost eight straight, averaging a measly 8.6 goals per game. They didn’t happen at the same time, but the two teams have swapped positions. The Black Bears have rediscovered their scoring touch and the Wings can’t score to save their lives.

Given the talent up front, it’s baffling why the Wings aren’t scoring. Many of their fans will likely blame GM Paul Day, and some have been calling for his head for a few years already. But if you look at the team he’s put together, it’s a solid team and they should be performing better than they are. I’d hesitate to blame Day. It’s easy to just blame head coach Ian Rubel and say he should be fired. But while he has lots of coaching experience on the bench around him, particularly 2022 Les Bartley award winner Tracey Kelusky, Rubel is a rookie as an NLL head coach. I’d give him another year and if there aren’t significant improvements, then look at making a change. I get that that will be difficult for Wings fans (as my son once said when he was very young, “It takes too long to be patient”), but these kinds of turnarounds generally take time.

Georgia announcer getting rules wrong

Georgia picked up a major penalty, and then Halifax scored a minute or two later. The PxP guy (who I’m not familiar with) then said that because the penalty was a major, it was a “non-releasable” penalty and so the fact that Halifax scored didn’t matter, meaning that the penalty was not terminated because of the goal. This is wrong. Majors require two goals to end the power play, so if Halifax had scored a second goal on that penalty, the power play would have been over and the announcer would likely have been confused. Colour commentator (and former NLL player) Drew Petkoff didn’t correct him, but I’m guessing that’s an announcer thing – you don’t correct your partner on-air. I don’t know if that’s a real thing, but I don’t think I’ve ever heard one announcer tell another one he’s wrong unless explicitly asked.

Getting a rule like this wrong is really not that big a deal. I’ve said this in the past but it bears repeating – announcers getting rules like this wrong is WAY more rare than it used to be, so now something fairly minor like this is so unusual that it makes this list. In general, that’s a good thing.