With playoff door open, Royals looking to stay

By Julie Pelchar Reading Eagle

On Saturday night, the din spilled from the dressing room and into the Sovereign Center hallway as it had after each of Reading’s first 24 home wins. A cacophony of clapping, singing, whoops and hollers, this season’s ritual — it must be some male-bonding sort of thing — had become as familiar as the smell of sweaty hockey equipment that fills the arena’s lower level. But Saturday’s celebration wasn’t any louder than usual. In fact, the hallway seemed quieter than it had been after previous wins. Rather than savoring the victory that had clinched their first ECHL Kelly Cup playoff berth, the Royals had already shifted their focus toward tonight. They want to ensure their first postseason isn’t over in the blink of an eye.
   That’s just the possibility Reading faces when the puck drops at Cambria County War Memorial for a Northern Division wild card game against Johnstown.
   Tonight, a mere 60 minutes will determine whether the Royals or the Chiefs join the league’s other 15 teams in division semifinals. The wild card winner advances to a five-game series that begins Thursday at top-seeded Wheeling.
   "We’re excited to get our foot in the door," said Reading winger Judd Medak, "and make a run for it."
   While the Royals try to advance to a series that would bring the first playoff game to Reading, surviving this play-in game is just as meaningful for Johnstown.
   Minor league hockey’s most storied team — think "Slap Shot" — is fighting to prolong a season that so far has been the best since the Chiefs joined the ECHL in the league’s inaugural 1988-89 season.
   Hosting the game gives Johnstown a decided advantage, not only because the Chiefs have lost just six times in 36 home games, but because the Royals are winless in four tries at old War Memorial, where they’ve scored just five times in 2003-04.
   "We’re going into a tough barn," said Reading center Graig Mischler. "If we play the way we did this weekend, though, I like our chances."
   On the heels of a near-disastrous March, the Royals responded with their most dominant weekend to sneak into the playoffs. In a pair of 3-2 victories, they outshot Johnstown 64-25 and Toledo 46-24.
   "We certainly are going in on a high," said Royals coach Derek Clancey. "We’ve had more than 100 shots the last two games by working hard, moving our feet down low, getting pucks out of our end — by doing the little things that make a big difference."
   The Chiefs not only have been the steadier team — they’re 10-1-1 in their last 12 and haven’t dropped more than two straight since early January — they also have stability on their side.
   Johnstown hasn’t been pestered by the American Hockey League call-up bug. A dozen skaters have played more than 60 games for the Chiefs. Only six have played more than that many with the Royals.
   Reading’s depth and balance — each of its three lines has answered with big performances in key late-season games — will have to overpower that Chiefs cohesiveness for the Royals to beat the odds and advance as the league’s lowest seed.
   "Anything can happen," Mischler said. "We don’t feel like we’re a fifth-place team. We feel like we have the caliber of team that we should be a first-place team, but for whatever reasons, we’re not there right now.
   "But we’re in the playoffs. So it doesn’t matter any more."
   Contact Julie Pelchar at 610-371-5065 or japelchar@readingeagle.com.

Reading Eagle: Diane Staskowski Cody Rudkowsky stops Brent Bilodeau on Johnstown’s final attempt in Friday’s overtime shootout. Preview of tonight’s game, D4