VANCOUVER - For their final two games of the season, UBC play host to Mount Royal and Alberta in a weekend that will determine playoff seeding heading into the postseason. All four of the top teams in the conference could still finish anywhere between first and fourth. With home advantage to play for and the opportunity to lay down a marker against opponents they are likely to face again in the coming weeks, this weekend promises to be huge.
Mount Royal sit two points outside a playoff berth and with six points up for grabs this weekend they will need no further encouragement to come out firing. UBC on the other hand are guaranteed to appear in the postseason but need at least one win to secure a home quarter-final. The Thunderbirds sit level on points with third-placed Victoria, and two points behind first-placed Alberta who they face on Saturday. Mount Royal are currently unbeaten on the road, a record of 2-0-1 and UBC will want to disassemble that statistic as this is the easier of the two ties they play. The majority of the Cougars offence has come through Kelsey Kinzner who has picked up six goals and one assist in their 10 games so far. With just 15 goals scored throughout the year, Mount Royal will have trouble threatening the T-Bird's impressive defense if they can nullify Kinzner's contributions.
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The only other undefeated team left the in the conference, Alberta, come to Thunderbird Stadium on Saturday. This will be arguably their toughest weekend of the year as they face Trinity Western University (won five straight) on Friday and UBC (won five straight) the next day. Both teams play two games in the space of 24 hours so neither can claim any real advantage in that regard, but the Pandas game against TWU is undisputedly the harder matchup when compared to UBC's Friday night showdown against Mount Royal. The Thunderbirds will be hoping their long-term rivals TWU will make life as difficult as possible for Alberta for all 90 minutes, while a couple of early goals of their own on Friday would allow head coach
Andrea Neil to rest her star players for the next night. Alberta not only boast the most productive offense in the conference, averaging 3.1 goals a game but also the league's most potent attacker in Julia Ignacio who has managed 10 goals and 9 assists in the 10 games she has played.
UBC will be looking to welcome back top scorer
Janine Frazao who has missed the last two games through injury. Should she be available this would offer a huge boost to the team and take some off the pressure off of rookie
Jasmin Dhanda and second-years
Shayla Chorney and
Nicole Sydor.
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