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A season that made a lot of people proud in Prince Albert has come to an end after Prince Albert Raiders lost to Everett Silvertips 7-2 on Friday night.
The 2026 WHL Championship Finals saw the Raiders, the best team in the Eastern Conference, make it through to take on the one team that had been a just a little more consistent all year long, the Silvertips who were the best in the Western Conference.
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Game 1 saw the Raiders head into Everett still battered off a series with Medicine Hat, while the Silvertips had 10 days rest and home ice, but the Raiders still pulled out a strong 4-2 win.
The Silvertips responded in Game 2 with a 6-2 win on home ice that was close until the final two minutes, when tensions boiled over.
With the next three games in Prince Albert, confidence for the Raiders was high, but the Silvertips came in ready for the noise. They had some bounces go their way for sure, but the Silvertips offence slowly got better and better while their defence held the Raiders to just two goals in four straight games.
They capped it off with a 7-2 win on Friday night for the Silvertips’ first Ed Chynoweth Cup.
For the fifth time in the series, the Silvertips scored first at the 1:08 mark. Zackary Shantz on the rush down the left wall made a pass to the middle, and Shea Busch poked in his first of the night from the right side.
Then, at the 15:57 mark, the Silvertips scored again just moments after Michal Orsulak made an incredible save but lost his stick on the play. The puck made its way back to the left point, and Matias Uyeda fired a wrist shot at a screen and it found the back of the net.
After 1: Raiders 0-2. Silvertips, shots 14-5 Silvertips
After a power play to start the period, the Raiders didn’t score but the momentum was quickly on their side at the 3:38 mark. Matyas Man started the play with a hold at the middle of the blue line, then sent the puck left to Aiden Oiring at the point. Oiring fired, Maddix McCagherty managed to tip the puck and generate a rebound, and Brayden Dube crashed in for his seventh of the playoffs.
Through the rest of the period, it looked like the Raiders had the momentum and were threatening to score again, but at 14:51 the Silvertips’ Brek Liske held the puck in, skated down the left side wall, then fired a wrist shot around a screen from below the hashmarks to regain the Silvertips lead.
Then on the power play, the Silvertips scored in the final minute. Shea Busch stormed into the zone down the left wall and fired a shot off the pad to create a rebound, but instead it banked off a Raiders defenceman and in for Busch’s second of the night at 19:16.
After 2: Raiders 1-4. Silvertips, shots 15-11 Silvertips, 29-16 Silvertips overall
At the 6:17 mark, Busch scored again when the puck came to him off the wall, and he quickly found the net on a wrist shot through traffic. Then, at 7:07, Nolan Chastko scored on a shot from the top of the left circle, and the Silvertips suddenly had a 6-1 lead.
The Raiders got one last moment to cheer for their captain however at the 11:04 mark. On the power play, Braeden Cootes worked the puck to the right point for Brock Cripps, and he centered it for the waiting Justice Christensen, and he fired one last “Juice Bomb” one-timer into the back of the net for his fifth goal of the playoffs, and fourth of the series.
The Silvertips still had the last laugh in the game, however, when Shantz and Landon DuPont worked the puck up the ice together, and DuPont finished the play on a backdoor feed at 15:50.
FINAL: Raiders 2-7. Silvertips, shots 8-7 Raiders, 36-24 Silvertips overall
Silvertips forward Julius Miettinen was named the WHL Playoffs MVP. Surprisingly, Game 5 was the only game of the series he was held without a point.
Playing in their final game at the Art Hauser Centre, the Raiders 20-year-olds Christensen, Oiring, and Dube all earned a point during the night.
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