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Frantic February follies

Feb 2, 2016 | 10:01 AM

A Frantic February unfolds Wednesday night for the Prince Albert Raiders when they host the Prince George Cougars.
The Raiders will continue their quest for a top-two spot in the WHL’s eastern division and home ice advantage in the first round of the playoffs by playing 11 of their 13 games during the abbreviated month in just 19 nights.
Heading into Tuesday’s action the Raiders held a three point lead on third place Moose Jaw with a game in hand on the Warriors knowing four of the five remaining head to head matchups are scheduled between February 10th and 27th. To say staying healthy is crucial throughout a widly busy month capped with key contests is a gross understatement.
However the Raiders have a lot of company. The schedule making computer programmer has done few favors down the stretch. The Prince Albert-Prince George clash (The Cougars first visit to the Art Hauser Centre in two seasons) is the fourth game in six nights for the Raiders. Meanwhile the eastern division leading Brandon Wheat Kings and Warriors play for the fourth time in five nights on Tuesday and when the Tigers host Swift Current Tuesday it will also mark the fourth game in five nights for the Medicine Hat mob. The Tigers who were already without three defensemen for Sunday’s game in Moose Jaw, lost overage forward Brian Williams to an injury in the third period.
The reason for the jam packed schedule is two-fold. This is the third year of the WHL’s experimentation with a computerized alternative to the General Managers annual day-long diatribe in June to hammer out a schedule and it’s been a miserable failure. Teams continue to endure road trip travel plans that make little sense and play mid-week home games with open nights on the weekends. There also appears to be more long home stands which is problematic for small market teams who don’t have enough hard core fans to keep the seats occupied .
The complicating factor is jamming in the entire 72-game regular season with one less week to do it. The teams decided to start a week later in hopes of getting their NHL drafted and invited players back in time for the regular season.
The biggest concern during the busiest month of the season which features the most important games is player safety do to fatigue.
It’s time for the league’s decision makers to get their heads out of the sand (or their backsides) and trim the schedule back to 66 games. Teams like the Prince Albert Raiders would benefit by saving money from three dollar devouring road trips and cut three mid-week games at home to focus on putting bums in the more well attended weekend seats.
This has been suggested several times before, but the big market teams who comprise the majority of the WHL’s power brokers have refused to part with that revenue. Those owners should take a closer look at the most recent WHL injured list which is at 58 players and very likely to grow.
dwilson@panow.com
On Twitter: RaidersVoice