Florida Division
Bold City Battalion (1) vs. Atlanta MadHatters (4)
Saturday, March 9, 7:30 p.m. EST
Sunday, March 10, 4:30 p.m. EST
Monday, March 11, 7:30 p.m. EST (If Necessary)
By Joshua Boyd / USPHLPremier.com
The Bold City Battalion have seen it before, many times. All kinds of Premier first-year teams have been to the Nationals in recent years, and some for many years in a row. From the first expansion class of 2018-19, for instance, the Metro Jets have made every single Nationals from 2019 to 2024.
So why shouldn’t it be the Battalion’s turn to make their own history? Well, there’s a team called the Atlanta MadHatters who have also never made it to the Nationals, so they’d also like to make their big debut on the biggest stage in the league.
“I fully expect this to be a war,” said Battalion head coach Rett Vossler. “It has been in all six of our matchups against Atlanta this season. They’re a well-coached, skilled team that can also play a heavy game. If they didn’t get devastated with injuries early in the year, they would have pushed for the regular season division title. We are well aware of the battle ahead of us, and we know that whoever comes out of this series as the winner is going to pay a price physically.”
“The series with Bold City is one to watch,” added Atlanta Head Coach Tyler Casillo. “We split the season series with them at three wins a piece. This series is going to come down to us playing our game and executing in all three zones. Bold City is an extremely strong team, who are very well coached. I am expecting them to bring it this weekend, like they have all year. We have prepared for this moment since August. Playing three-game series all year helps prepare you for the playoffs and I think that will play to our advantage. I am looking forward to two top teams going to battle this weekend.”
The Bold City Battalion and Atlanta MadHatters both went 3-2-1-0 during the season series. Four of the games were one-goal decisions one way or the other.
“I am extremely happy with how we have grown as a group this season. Starting the year 0-7-1 and digging ourselves out of that hole showed tremendous growth and maturity by our guys,” said Casillo. “We have continued to get better every month of the season, playing some of our best hockey the second half of the year.”
Leading Atlanta this year offensively was actually the defenseman Eoin Reager, scoring 38 points in 42 games. Michal Novak was second at 34 points in 42 games, and Premier veteran Matthew Hamacher finished with 20 goals and 29 points in 35 games, including six goals in his five games as a MadHatter.
Goaltending-wise, Sam Edmands has been a great bright spot for Atlanta with his .934 save percentage and 11-7-1-0 record. D’Mar McCoy went 6-4-2-0 as well, winning as recently as Feb. 25. Herman Renden was also in net for 10 games.
Goaltending was also a strength for Bold City. Onni Taskila went 11-1-2-0 and Aiden Winslow went 16-10-0-0 and posted a .935 save percentage.
Brett Strick’s 52 points led the team, and both Sebastian Elrod and Jacob Duhaime had 48 points apiece. Emil Grinsvall was almost a point-per-game player with 41 points in 42 games.
“We have basically just been keeping the train rolling. We don’t want to change too much in our game at this point, we really like where we are at,” said Vossler. “Finally having a (mostly) healthy group for the first time this season, things are looking great.”
