Tonight’s broadcast

Mt. Juliet-Wilson Central-Green Hill vs. Tennessee Outlaws - 8:30 PM pregame, 8:35 PM faceoff BROADCAST LINK

Senior Night ceremonies

No team is having a Senior Night ceremony tonight. Centennial-FRA were supposed to do theirs tonight before playing Ravenwood, but they will now hold it before playing the Outlaws on January 15.

Scenarios for tonight

Brentwood will lock up a spot in the Henry Hine Cup if they LOSE TO OR TIE WITH Ensworth-Nolensville-Lipscomb, OR the Tennessee Outlaws DEFEAT Mt. Juliet-Wilson Central-Green Hill.

The Rutherford Rampage will lock up a spot in the Henry Hine Cup if they LOSE TO JPII-MLK, OR they TIE WITH JPII-MLK, AND the Tennessee Outlaws DEFEAT Mt. Juliet-Wilson Central-Green Hill.

Mt. Juliet-Wilson Central-Green Hill will lock up a spot in the Henry Hine Cup if they LOSE TO OR TIE WITH the Tennessee Outlaws.

The Tennessee Outlaws will be eliminated from contention for the GNASH Cup regular season championship if THEY LOSE TO OR TIE WITH Mt. Juliet-Wilson Central-Green Hill, OR Ensworth-Nolensville-Lipscomb DEFEAT OR TIE WITH Brentwood, WHICHEVER COMES FIRST.

Previewing tonight’s games

The game that MTSN is broadcasting is in BOLD.

Franklin (8-3-0) vs. Independence-BA-USN-Nashville Christian (2-6-1) - 5:30 PM @ Centennial A
This is Franklin’s last game before the holiday break, so, they’ll obviously want to go in on a winning note. The Admirals actually can clinch a Predators Cup berth this week; they need to win tonight, plus have Centennial lose both of their games this week to do so. It might not happen, but them ending up with a Preds Cup berth feels inevitable. They’re facing an Indy team fresh off of dominating the Rampage back on November 20 to collect their second win of the season (I actually watched some of that game, and they were clearly the better team). For the Eagles, the pattern immediately repeats: Beat a team that’s around your level, then turn around, and face one of the teams at the very top (they beat Father Ryan, then had to face Ensworth the game after; they beat the Rampage, now they have to face Franklin). Unfortunately for them, I think this game will go the same way as the Ensworth game did. The good news for Indy is Barrett Teasdale finally wraps up his seven-game suspension for picking up a head contact match penalty against Summit on September 30, so, they should get him back for their next game against Centennial on Wednesday. Meanwhile, Franklin will be without Aidan Murphy, who’s suspended for tonight for picking up a spearing major against Ravenwood two weeks ago.

Pick: Franklin

Centennial-FRA (4-5-0) vs. Ravenwood (7-1-0) - 7:05 PM @ Centennial A
One of the biggest surprises of the season so far is how anemic the Cougars’ offense has been; they’ve only scored 23 goals in nine games. Even more surprising is how the scoring has been spread: Nick Claas and Brendan Mitchell each have seven, Aiden Gardner only has two, and Alex Aziminia only has one (little sister Avery has two). No wonder they had the game they were supposed to play against the Rangers this Friday rescheduled to two weeks ago; they probably would’ve lost without their travel players. Now, they have to play the best team in the league. Meanwhile, after having a light workload for the first ten weeks of the regular season, the Raptors will be quite busy during these next two weeks, playing four games. Ravenwood can clinch a Predators Cup berth this week, provided they win both of their games; I’m saying that they will.

Pick: Ravenwood

Ensworth-Nolensville-Lipscomb (10-0-2) vs. Brentwood (3-8-1) - 7:40 PM @ Centennial B
The Ice Tigers finally secured a Predators Cup berth on their third attempt when they beat JPII a week-and-a-half ago. Now, they turn their focus on trying to secure the 1 seed for the Preds Cup (which would also come with the GNASH Cup regular season championship, FYI). Their offense has slowed down quite a bit since beating the Rangers 15-1 on October 9, as they’ve only scored more than three goals in just two games (beating the Rampage 6-1 on October 28, and Indy 8-0 on November 13). The question is, which Brentwood goalie do they face tonight? That depends on whether or not Chris Orem is still trying to get the Bruins into the Preds Cup, even though their chances are now slim to none. Losing to a winless Mt. Juliet with Andrew Sallee in goal might force him to wave the white flag on that, and give Collier Owen the crease tonight. The Bruins were actually in a decent position coming into play two weeks ago, then they went down 5-1 after one against the Outlaws, replaced Owen with Sallee, and nearly came back, but fell short. That was damaging, but not crippling. The loss to Mt. Juliet was crippling. There’s no coming back from that. Now, they have to fact the league leaders, and I just don’t see a way for them to beat them.

Pick: Ensworth

JPII-MLK (6-3-0) vs. Rutherford Rampage (4-8-0) - 8:30 PM @ Bellevue-Crisp
JPII’s three losses have been to teams that were simply better than them. That’s it. They’ve also only played nine games up to this point, so, the number look a bit skewed. Their remaining schedule is mostly kind to them; they’ve got some tough games out there, but about half of them are winnable, and that includes tonight’s game. The Rampage are coming off of a pretty demoralizing week before the break: They blew a 4-1 third period lead against Station Camp, then got whipped by Indy. They’ve lost three straight after a 9-2 win over Brentwood on November 7 that had them sitting in the Top 8. It’s about to be four straight.

Pick: JPII

Mt. Juliet-Wilson Central-Green Hill (1-8-2) vs. Tennessee Outlaws (5-3-2) - 8:35 PM @ Centennial A
So, the Golden Bears finally got off the winless train, leaving the Rangers as the only team in the league with a goose egg in the win column. Like the Indy-Rampage game, I watched some of that MJ-Brentwood game, and the Bears were the more dominant team, easily. Like Franklin, the Bears are also playing their last game before the holiday break tonight. They are taking on an Outlaws team that are suddenly the favorites to grab the eighth and final place in the Predators Cup. Winning tonight would go a long way towards ultimately securing that spot. And they need to win tonight, because their next three games are against Summit, JPII, and Montgomery Bell (and all will be played before the holidays, too; in fact, they’ll only have one game left once we get back from that break, against Centennial on the 15th). Or maybe not, since some of the teams behind them still have to play the likes of JPII, Ravenwood, MBA, and Franklin themselves. Either way, I think the Outlaws should walk away with the win tonight.

Pick: Outlaws

Standings

The rest of this week’s schedule

The games that MTSN is planning to broadcast are in BOLD. A team that is having a Senior Night ceremony on that particular night is underlined.

Wednesday
Station Camp-Liberty Creek vs. Father Ryan - 7:10 PM @ Centennial A
Hendersonville-Beech-Lawson vs. Montgomery County Rangers - 7:30 PM @ Ford-Clarksville
Centennial-FRA vs. Independence-BA-USN-Nashville Christian - 8:30 PM @ Centennial B
Ravenwood vs. Summit-Page - 8:45 PM @ Centennial A

Friday
Summit-Page vs. Tennessee Outlaws - 5:45 PM @ Antioch-North

Podcasts

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Miscellaneous links

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The next newsletter comes out tomorrow, December 3.