WHL Championship: Game 3 Player to Watch – Zack Ostapchuk
For the first time ever, the Winnipeg ICE and Seattle Thunderbirds meet in the WHL Championship Series. The best-of-seven series is tied 1-1 following Games 1 and 2 in Winnipeg. Game 3 is set for Tuesday, May 16 (7:05 p.m. PT) at accesso ShoWare Center in Kent, Wash. The best-of-seven series will follow a 2-3-2 format with the winner of the Ed Chynoweth Cup advancing to the 2023 Memorial Cup in Kamloops, B.C.
Visit SeattleThunderbirds.com for tickets or catch the action from home on TSN 3 & 5 in Canada, on Fox13+ in the Seattle area, or on WHL Live in the United States and internationally.
Zack Ostapchuk
St. Albert, Alta.
Ottawa Senators, 2-39 (2021)
Centre
#20
6-foot-3, 198 pounds
2023 WHL Playoffs
15GP – 8G-4A–12 points
Zack Ostapchuk can do it all. He really can.
Need a goal? Check – Ostapchuk has registered eight in 15 playoff games.
Looking for someone with a sense for the setup? Check – Ostapchuk recorded 36 assists in 55 regular season contests this season.
Are you looking for a big hit to shift the momentum? Yup, Ostapchuk has you covered.
Perhaps most importantly – do you need a big faceoff won in the defensive zone? Ostapchuk is your man for that as well. To date in the WHL Playoffs, the big man from St. Albert has been successful on more than 53 per cent of his draws.
With the best-of-seven 2023 WHL Championship Series presented by Nutrien shifting south to Kent, Wash., and tied 1-1 after the first leg in Winnipeg, the two-way force of Ostapchuk is the sort of presence that can help to swing momentum when there is a razor-thin divide between two evenly-matched teams.
“We know they’re a really, really good team with a lot of high-end guys,” Ostapchuk said. “But so are we. It’s one of those series where mistakes tend to bite you in the butt if you make them. You try to limit those and whoever limits them the most wins the game.
“We have four centremen who can all play big minutes. We can all shut down team’s top lines, we can all score goals. We’re very versatile up the middle and that’s one of the strengths of our team.”
Tuesdays are well known to be rather raucous at the accesso ShoWare Center, and Ostapchuk is no stranger to that having started his WHL career with the Vancouver Giants, so he’s well prepared for this Tuesday’s all-important Game 3 showdown in Kent.
“You get excited about it,” Ostapchuk said of playing at accesso ShoWare Center. “It can be a hard building to play in here, they get loud and we kind of feed off that, too. It will be a lot of fun.”
Game 3 of the 2023 WHL Championship Series presented by Nutrien goes Tuesday, May 16 at accesso ShoWare Center in Kent (7 p.m. PT, TSN 3/5, Fox 13+ Seattle, WHL Live – U.S. & International).
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