Seasonal series may be deceiving

• The Rockets and Americans met four times this season, with the Am's winning all four games by a combined score of 20-5. Looks bad on paper right? Let's remember that the Rockets opened the 2009-2010 road schedule in Tri City with a 6-1 loss. Not making excuses, but the Rockets no longer have six players from that night that are currently playing with the existing team. Of those six, only Kyle St. Denis is technically with the organization.
• It was weird scheduling this season. The Rockets and Americans met four times in Kelowna's first 31 games. So essentially they didn't see each other in the second half of the season. Is it fair to say the Rockets were a much different team in the second half? I think it is. The Americans didn't change much. They were as good in the first half as they were in the second half. You don't play consistent hockey all season long and come three wins shy of 50. They were darn good from start to finish. Hello - 97 points!
• Here are the scores in the seasonal series: (6-1 L) and (5-1 L) in Tri City and (4-2 L) and (5-1 L) in Kelowna.
• The Rockets were 4 for 25 on the power play in the seasonal series (16%) while the Am's were 4 for 19 (21.1%)
• The Americans out-shot the Rockets 128-107 in the four games. The Americans averaged 32 shots on goal while the Rockets fired 26.8 shots the other way.
• The Americans out-scored the Rockets 7-1 in the first period in the four games and 7-2 in the second period. The third wasn't much better, where the Ams had 6 goals compared to the Rockets two.
• These two teams met in last years Western Conference semi finals with the Rockets winning in six games. The Rockets were 1 and 2 at the Toyota Center in that series, losing 4-3 and 3-2 before earning a 5-2 win April 10th in game five.
• Since the Rockets re-located to Kelowna for the start of the 2005-06 season, these two teams have met three previous times in the playoffs. In 1996, Tri City was a winner in six games in the opening round. In 2004, the Rockets used six games to advance to the conference finals. Obviously last season the Rockets won a second round series, also in six games.
• Rockets captain Lucas Bloodoff was a 6th round draft pick of the Americans in the 2004 WHL Bantam draft. Bloodoff never played a game with the Americans, before being traded to Kelowna June 2/2006.
• Riley McIntosh is now a 19 year-old d-man with the Americans. McIntosh, a second round pick of the Rockets in 2005, was picked just behind Tyler Myers and ahead of Brandon McMillan, who was the Rockets 3rd round selection in that draft.
• 333 miles. That's the distance from Kelowna to Tri City. In kilometers that adds up to 535 k. The trip can easily be completed in five hours for those wishing to watch the Rockets on the road. If you compare that distance to an opening round playoff series with Everett, the difference is just 25 kilometers more.
• It's interesting to note that no less than a days grace has been given between games played in the two cities. In other words, you won't see the teams battling in Tri City one night and then busing through the night to play in Kelowna the next. We saw that in round one where the two teams played in Everett in game five and raced each other back to Kelowna for game six one night later.