HALIFAX — The Guelph Storm won't be feeling the love at the Memorial Cup Sunday night that they experienced the day before.
The Storm had the Halifax fans on their side Saturday, when the opened the tournament with a 5-2 win over the Rouyn-Noranda Huskies, the team that beat Halifax in the Quebec league final.
But Sunday Guelph plays Halifax in a battle of 1-0 teams that will have most of the 10,000 fans at Scotiabank Centre screaming for their Moose.
Guelph is technically the home team Sunday.
"We know that the environment is going to be pro the visiting team and that's not us," said Storm coach George Burnett,.
The keys for the Storm, according to their coach: "Have the puck, play smart and try to spend as much time as we can in the offensive zone.
"They're a top team, they're here for a reason, they've earned their way here and we respect that," said Burnett of the host team.
Despite the big win to open the tournament, Burnett was still concerned about the turnovers the team committed in Game 1.
"They're a quick-strike team and if we're going to turn the puck over like we did last night we'll be on our heels and probably pay a price," Burnett said.
"We have to manage the puck extremeley well, their D are heavily involved in their attack and they get great goaltending," he said.
As for the quick turnaround for Game 2 just 24 hours later, Burnett said he wasn't concerend.
"The kids would rather play than practice at this point," he said.
In what has pretty much become the mantra for every player and coach in Halifax, the Storm's Cedric Ralph said the Guelph Storm's focus is on the Guelph Storm.
"We're expecting a hard paced game, but again for us our big key is just to focus on ourselves and play the way we can play," said Ralph.
"If we do the same as we did last night, we'll be able to come through."
Halifax coach Eric Veilleux was taking the same approach.
"We have a style, and even though we've watched them play, it's important to concentrate on how we play and what we do," Veilleux said.
As for not having the last change despite being in their own building, Veilleux said he may "tweak" his lines a bit if he doesn't like what he sees.
"We'll see how we match up and if I don't like it, there's always ways to go around it," he said.
Does the Guelph Storm present any particular unique problems in the way they play?
"We'll see tonight," Veilleux said.
"Before you play them, you don't know. We watched them play against the (Ottawa) 67's, we watched them play (Saturday). They do have some big offensive players. They have a solid team. They're complete. But we're a good team too and we just have to stick to our game plan and go from there."
Game time Sunday is 7 p.m.
