The best time of the year starts this week in the Capital Region Junior Hockey League.
The 2026 CRJHL playoffs will kick off Monday with a pair of Game 1s in best-of-five series between the No. 7 North Winnipeg Satellites on the road against the No. 2 Beausejour Comets, and the No. 5 Arborg Ice Dawgs heading south to face the No. 4 La Broquerie Habs.
Arborg’s Brandon Burak finished as the league’s leading scorer with 54 points to earn CRJHL most valuable player honours, while teammate Tytan Johnson was named CRJHL rookie of the year and top defenceman
The No. 6 Lundar Falcons and No. 3 Selkirk Fishermen make up the other first-round series, which will begin Tuesday evening in Selkirk.
By finishing the regular season with the most points (72), the St. Malo Warriors earned a first-round bye and advance directly to the best-of-seven semifinal round.
“This year, with the seven teams that have been involved, everything has been competitive and it’s really been close hockey games,” said league commissioner Chris Poponick. “Up until a certain point in the game where it might get a couple of goals spread, but games have been back and forth, especially in the second half of the season. Playoffs are another animal, it’s a best-of-five series, so you’ve got to beat the other team three times, and anything can happen.”
Each first-round series will play at least three games this week and could extend as late as Friday, March 6, if necessary.
All seven clubs concluded their regular-season schedules this past week, with each team playing its 30th game of the season.
Arborg’s Brandon Burak finished as the league’s leading scorer with 54 points, earning CRJHL most valuable player honours in last Thursday’s awards announcement.
Burak, however, wasn’t the lone Ice Dawg winning hardware, as rookie teammate Tytan Johnson was named both CRJHL rookie of the year and top defenceman after tallying 43 points as a freshman blueliner.
A pair of La Broquerie Habs rounded out the award winners as Jaxon Loewen took home top goalie and Mario Gagnon received most sportsmanlike honours.
“They are just guys that seem to come out and play hard,” said Poponick. “All the finalists in each of the categories were all good hockey players, and if I was picking a team I’d be very happy to grab any one of them to put on the roster. They all bring something a little bit different to the table. The rookie and top defenceman, that’s kind of a different one. We haven’t had that happen in all the years, but I’m really looking forward to see how he progresses as well.”
