2024 Road to Memorial Cup: OHL Championship Series preview
A pair of no. 1 seeds will meet with the J. Ross Robertson Cup on the line.
The Eastern Conference’s Oshawa Generals will compete for an OHL title for the first time since they were victorious in 2015 while the Western Conference’s London Knights find themselves in the OHL Championship Series for the second straight season.
Oshawa’s 13 J. Ross Robertson Cup’s are the most in league history while London are four-time champions with their most recent success coming in 2016.
The clubs met twice in the regular season; Easton Cowan had the overtime winner Feb. 11 in a 4-3 come-from-behind win while the Gens won 6-4 Feb. 28.
(1) Oshawa vs. (1) London
It took them four attempts but Oshawa finally clinched its spot in the OHL Championship Series after a Game 7 win over North Bay.
Oshawa cruised to a 3-0 lead as they outscored the Battalion 12-4 highlighted by a Jacob Oster shutout in a 3-0 Game 2 victory. However, they’d drop Game 4 in overtime after Sandis Vilmanis’ (FLA) winner while in Game 5, Ty Nelson (SEA) scored the game-winner in double overtime.
After an 8-1 loss in Game 6, the Gens regrouped for Game 7 where a three-point (2G, 1A) effort from Dylan Roobroeck (NYR) led them to victory.
Cal Ritchie (COL) had 12 points in the series while Connor Lockhart, Beckett Sennecke and Stuart Rolofs each scored four times. Oster, the OHL’s goaltender of the year, recorded a .910 save percentage.
The Generals needed six games to beat Barrie in the first round while they swept their way past Ottawa in Round 2.
Ritchie’s 25 postseason points are the second most in the OHL – and the active leader – while Roobroeck and Sennecke are just two of four skaters to record double-digit goals. Despite a long series, Oster’s .923 save percentage and 2.29 GAA leads all goaltenders that have played at least 10 games.
The Generals, who won 40 games in the regular season for the first time since 2019, last hoisted the J. Ross Robertson Cup in 2015, the same year they would also claim the Memorial Cup.
For the second straight season, the Knights will get a crack at the OHL title.
A year ago they fell in six games to Peterborough but with much of the same core have put themselves in position to claim a another OHL title.
London knocked off 2024 Memorial Cup presented by Dow hosts Saginaw in Round 3 in six games. The Knights built a 2-0 series lead after a pair of 3-1 home wins but dropped Game 3 6-2 to suffer their first loss of the postseason. A 7-3 win in Game 4 put them ahead 3-1 in the series but Saginaw remained alive after a 4-2 win in Game 5. However, the Knights took Game 6 4-2 on the road to earn a ninth Wayne Gretzky Trophy as Western Conference champions.
Cowan led the Knights with 11 points (five goals) in the series while Ruslan Gazizov, Kasper Halttunen (SJ) and Sam O’Reilly had three goals each. Michael Simpson, who backstopped the Petes to last year’s title, recorded a .914 save percentage in the series.
In the first two rounds, London swept Flint and Kitchener respectively.
Cowan’s 19 points tops all Knights players in the postseason but London’s 14 games played are the fewest of any remaining team. Halttunen has found the back of the net nine times, the fifth most in the OHL. Simpson owns a .911 save percentage and 2.59 GAA.
The Knights, who won 50 games in the regular season for the first time since 2016, are in search of a fifth OHL championship under Dale Hunter.
Series schedule:
Game 1 — May 9 — OSH @ LDN — 7pm ET / 4pm PT
Game 2 — May 11 — OSH @ LDN — 7pm ET / 4pm PT
Game 3 — May 13 — LDN @ OSH — 7pm ET / 4pm PT
Game 4 — May 15 — LDN @ OSH — 7pm ET / 4pm PT
Game 5* — May 17 — OSH @ LDN — 7pm ET / 4pm PT
Game 6* — May 19 — LDN @ OSH — TBD
Game 7* — May 20 — OSH @ LDN — TBD
*if necessary
Watch live
TSN will provide complete coverage of the WHL, OHL, and QMJHL Championship Series beginning with Game 1 while RDS will showcase the QMJHL Championship Series from Game 1 onward. Full coverage of the WHL, OHL, and QMJHL Championship Series will also be available on CHL TV to fans worldwide while select games will air on NHL Network in the United States.