The Port Moody Panthers definitely won't be caught unprepared when they take to the ice Saturday night to host the Mission City Outlaws to open their Pacific Junior Hockey League season.
"We've played 11 exhibition games which is definitely a lot more than anybody else," said Panthers head coach and GM Jamie Jackson. "Eleven games is a quarter of our season so we have a pretty good understanding of what we're going to bring. We'll definitely have a very fast-paced game on the ice."
The Panthers wrapped up their gruelling exhibition season over the weekend, falling 6-1 to the Abbotsford Pilots on Saturday before blanking the Grandview Steelers 4-0 Sunday.
"[Abbotsford is] a pretty strong group and it definitely helped some of our younger guys adjust to the level we're going to see," said Jackson. "Against Grandview, we definitely got some outstanding goaltending that really gave us a chance to get the win."
Alex Orth faced more than 40 shots in the win and he will make up the Panthers goaltending tandem along with Brenden Sharp.
"We did get Sharp back from the Surrey Eagles so the two of them will share the cage until someone emerges."
Jackson expects the Panthers to use a quick transition game to take advantage of the smaller ice surface in Port Moody.
"We're going to get the puck into our forwards' hands as soon as we can," he said. "We will be getting the puck deep as much as we can to take advantage of some of the size we have on the wing. We really have to control the puck down low and on the walls and get good possession time for us to be an effective hockey team."
Jackson anticipates scoring will be balanced throughout the lineup although he's hoping Brendin Logan and Wolfgang Schoenefuhs can emerge as scoring leaders.
"The addition of [Daniel] Delbianco has definitely created offence from the back end and Jordan Wharrie is very offensive on the back end as well so we're expecting him to contribute."
Wharrie just returned to the Panthers from the Everett Silvertips of the Western Hockey League. The 16-year-old Port Moody product was the Silvertips' fifth-round pick, 98th overall, in the 2012 WHL Bantam Draft.
Wharrie is one of eight rookies who will be joining a Panthers team that struggled through a 6-36-2 season last year.
"It was definitely difficult. We just made so many changes the personalities in the room I wasn't comfortable with. We had to get some guys in there that I felt that we could coach and we could plan for [down the road]," said Jackson, who realized by Christmas that the playoffs were slipping out of reach.
"It was a hard experience for some guys and the guys coming back now know how hard this league can be."
The puck drops on the Panthers' season at 7:45 p.m. Saturday in the Port Moody Arena, with the team heading to Burnaby Sunday to take on the Steelers.
