TULSA, Okla — As the Central Hockey League playoffs draw closer, the Tulsa Oilers find themselves in a close race for playoff position. Six points separate third place from sixth place in the Northern Conference, as Bossier-Shreveport, Mississippi, and Missouri are battling with Tulsa for one of the final three playoff spots. Rapid City and Colorado are comfortably sitting at the top of the conference standings, with 72 and 68 points respectively. 
The Oilers have been making their case of late, as they have gained ten points in the last seven games. One area of concern though, has been the power play, which has seen a slight increase in production lately after a string of poor outings. Tulsa has converted 8 of 51 man advantages through the last eleven games, with two coming Tuesday night against Missouri. “The way the game is called nowadays, your specialty teams are vital to your success,” head coach Bruce Ramsay said. “When your power play is not going good, you want to simplify it. You want to get pucks to the net and you want to get traffic in front. That’s one area where we’ve been working a lot better.” “The power play is a funny thing,” Ramsay continued. “You might have the worst power play for two minutes, then you get one good opportunity to score and the power play is great. We’ve had very good puck movement, and we’ve had good opportunities throughout that stretch where it wasn’t going very good and the puck wasn’t going in. Sometimes you’ve just got to get those bounces and opportunities.” 
As of press time, Tulsa was tied with Mississippi in fourth place, with a record of 24-20-4. Mississippi owned a record of 23-22-6 with a Wednesday night game scheduled at Wichita. Bossier-Shreveport sat in third place, while Missouri edged within two points of Tulsa and Mississippi with a shootout win against the Oilers on Tuesday night. “Its an exciting time for the fans and players, this is what hockey is all about,” Ramsay said. Even while in a close race for the playoffs, Ramsay is confident in his squad. “I’d rather be where Colorado and Rapid City are, but every game for us now is a playoff game. That’s the way we’re treating things and we’ve got to come out and play with passion, heart and energy. What we have to do is worry about what we can take care of and what we control. We can’t control what other teams are going to do.” As the team continues to close in on the playoffs, Ramsay said that his concerns are for the players to remain healthy, and to gain good positioning. “It would be great to have home ice advantage if we have to play the first round three-game series, but we’re not that far behind Shreveport either and we have a lot of games coming up against them…Missouri is knocking on the door and they’ve been playing well, so it’s a tight race. On of these four is not going to make it, and it definitely is not going to be us.” Contact the author at john.hall@prohockeynews.com Contact the photographer at les.stockton@prohockeynews.com
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