A week away from the start of the 2016 MasterCard Memorial Cup in Red Deer, Alberta, the London Knights have emerged as the first league champion to secure their spot in the annual event to determine Canadian Hockey League supremacy.

Arizona Coyotes prospect Christian Dvorak provided the lone goal in a closely contested 1-0 road victory over the Niagara IceDogs on Wednesday as the Knights completed a 4-0 series sweep. London established a new OHL playoff record with their 13th consecutive win to claim their fourth championship in franchise history.

Joining the 2005 Knights as the second OHL team since the installment of a conference playoff format in 1999 to go 16-2, the talented group led by OHL Playoff MVP Mitch Marner suffered a pair of first round losses to the Owen Sound Attack before their dominant run.

“It’s been far from easy,” said Marner after Wednesday’s win that sends the Knights to their fourth MasterCard Memorial Cup in five seasons. “The Owen Sound series really woke us up. We had to really take a look at ourselves and make some adjustments. We knew how talented Kitchener, Erie and Niagara were and we played our best hockey all the way through to get us here.”

Marner and Dvorak both finished the OHL playoffs on 16-game point streaks as the Knights enter the 2016 MasterCard Memorial Cup in Red Deer with the wind at their back.

There’s no doubt that the Knights are at their best right now, surpassing their season-high winning streak of nine games from Nov. 22 to Dec. 11 with 13 straight in consecutive sweeps of Midwest Division foes before ending a run of 10-straight wins by the Eastern Conference champion Niagara IceDogs.

MasterCard Memorial Cup history reveals mixed results for teams able to string together success similar to London’s this past month.

The Knights can look to the 1989 Memorial Cup champion Swift Current Broncos, a team led by five 100-point scorers in Tim Tisdale, Peter Kasowski, Sheldon Kennedy, Dan Lambert and Brian Sakic, as a model of success.

The Broncos went on a 12-game run through the WHL Playoffs, sweeping Moose Jaw, Saskatoon and Portland before winning the first Memorial Cup title in franchise history by a score of 4-3 on Tisdale’s overtime winner against the host Saskatoon Blades.

History’s good news ends there for teams with lengthy playoff winning streaks however.

The 1986 Hull Olympiques won a QMJHL-record 15 straight playoff contests before losing twice to the Guelph Platers at the MasterCard Memorial Cup in Portland, Oregon. The Olympiques lost the Memorial Cup final to Guelph by a score of 6-2 despite a goal from Luc Robitaille whose eight tallies in the event remains a Memorial Cup record today.

The Windsor Spitfires emerged two years later, winning 12 straight playoff games enroute to their first OHL championship in franchise history to gain entry to the 1988 MasterCard Memorial Cup in Chicoutimi, Quebec. Windsor’s 12 game run that stood as an OHL playoff record until Wednesday gave them the momentum to go 3-0 in the round robin before suffering a heartbreaking 7-6 championship loss to the Medicine Hat Tigers on Mark Pederson’s late third period winner.

In more recent history, the 2006 Vancouver Giants won 12 straight WHL playoff games before beginning the Moncton-based event 0-2, eventually losing to the host Wildcats 3-1 in the semi-final game.

Regardless of past trends, the London Knights head west for the MasterCard Memorial Cup in the hunt for their second CHL crown and first since 2005 powered offensively by the dominant trio of Marner, Dvorak and top NHL Draft prospect Matthew Tkachuk.

After a hard-earned break, the Knights kick-off the 2016 MasterCard Memorial Cup schedule against the well-rested host Rebels on Friday May 20th at 6:00pm MT/8:00pm ET.