CFHL 2026 Cherry Cup

 CFHL Cherry Cup

The Alex Assassins are the 2026 Cherry Cup Champions after a close battle with the California Raisins!  The Assassins held on to defeat the Raisins 3-3-1 winning the matchup by being the higher seeded home team.  

This game looked like another Assassins steam roll game as they went up 5-2 earlier in the week.  But the excitement was about to begin on the final night of the NHL season.  With the Assassins up 3-2-2 and the Raisins only having 2 skaters left it would appear the Assassins were heading toward an easy win.  But not so fast my friend.  When you have Macklin Celebrini on the ice, nothing is over!  The game was tied with goals and PPP so a single goal or PPP for the Raisins and they would flip the game and take the lead.

And the Raisins did just that!  Celebrini would notch two points by getting an assist on a power play taking the lead in PPP and tying the game 3-3-1!  Then out of a very unusual place, the Raisins get a goal from Lawson Crouse, who they just picked up before this week!  That goal gave them lead in goals and the game was 4-3!  Celebrinin would add another goal, to give them some breathing room in goals up 5-3.

Macklin celebrates notching the assist to tie game!

Where did this guy come from?  
Lawson scores the go ahead goal for Raisins

Celebrini celebriniates his goal!

The Raisins would survive the onslaught of Assassin players late in the game with Brock Nelson for the Avs anchoring their power play along with Devon Toews who normally plays on the PK, but with players out, played the point on the power play.  Not to mention Brandt Clake for the Kings on power plays.  

But the real deciding factor became goalies.  Raisins star goalie Karel Vejmelka played only two periods in the Mammoth loss, forgoing a very valuable goalie win.  While the Avs, with several players resting, decided to play their number one goalie for some reason in Scott Wedgewood.  All he needed to do is win the game and the Assassins would tie goalie wins and make the game 3-3-1 sealing the victory.   He not only did that, he stopped all 22 shots for the shut out earning him Cherry Cup MVP honors!

So congratulations to Alex Cherry owner of the Alex Assassins on their second Cherry Cup!  They won just back in 2022 defeating the Greek Empire.  This season they had little trouble all year, but just before the playoffs started they lost their best player Leon Draisaitl.  This didn't stop them however as other players stepped up to fill the gaps and lead the Assassins to the Cup Finals.

CFFL Playoffs round 2

 Well it looks like the Cherry Cup will once again have a Cherry name on it.  Will the Assassins get their name on the cup for a second time, or will the California Raisins win their first Cherry Cup?

The Raisins got there outlasting the defending champs Who Gives a Puck winning 4-2-1.  All the Raisins really needed was one more hit and 2 assists and they would have won with the games wrapping up.  Getting 6 hits on Sunday for the Raisins helped but the true story of this match up was the goal tending.  Goal tending had been the Puck's nemesis all season long but they were no match for the Raisins netminders.  They Raisins ended up with 5 wins with a SV% of .899.  Oettinger had 3 wins while Vejmelka had 2.  While the Raisins had trouble finding the back of the net, they were able to get 5 assists from Juraj Slafkovsky (say that name 3x fast).

No Draisaitl? No problem.  The Assassins just keep rolling on, defeating the Space Monkey Mafia 5-1-1. Nick Suzuki filled in just fine scoring 2 goals and getting 4 assists for the Assassins.  Leading the scoring was Jason Robertson who had 4 goals and Mark Stone who had 3.  It was a close one in net as both teams tallied 4 wins each.  But the big edge in SV% went to the Assassins as Logan Thompson and Scott Wedgewood combined for a .948 SV%.  

2026 Cherry Cup Finals:  California Raisins at Alex's Assassins

I am not sure the Assassins can be stopped.  Even without Draisaitl.  It's going to be a short week as last day for games is Thursday April 16.  Plus some teams might rest players and some teams might only have a game left.  Its going to be an intense 4 days!  

Overall, these teams are pretty evenly matched.  They are 1 and 2 in the league with blocks.  Both are close in assists and the Assassins probably drop a notch without Draisaitl.  Raisins do play a heavier game as they were 2nd in hits this season compared to Assassins rank of 7.  

Its hard to rule out a team that have Celebrini and Crosby on it for the Raisins.  Will Cuylle and Tom Wilson will start to keep pounding the Assassins on the boards.  As long as Suzuki and Robertson keep playing as well as they have, the Assassins will be tough to beat.

In net it's pretty close too.  Both were top in the league in goalie wins.  Oettinger has been a stud but so has Logan Thompson and Wedgwood.  I may give a slight advantage to the Assassins.

In the end it just seems like the Assassins are a team of destiny as they have steam rolled the entire league all season long.  It should be close and a key will be the remaining schedule, who's playing, and will the owners adjust accordingly?  Assassins 4-2-1

CFHL Playoffs Round 1

 The CFHL playoffs have begun.  The first round saw one stinker of a game and one that came down to a final power play assist!  Crazy!

First the Stinker.  The California Raisins almost completely swept all categories against the Krampus Carols, winning 6-1.  I mean hits and blocks were ridiculous.  Raisins had 50 hits compared to 11 by the Krampus, and that was with Cuylle on the bench with 17 more hits!  Raisins had 40 blocks compared to 18 by the Krampus.  Celebrini had 5 goals for the Raisins while Sid "The Kid" Crosby had 7 assists, 3 PPP, 5 hits and 5 blocks!  

The Raisins now move on and face the defending champion Who Gives a Puck.  The Puck bring the Golden Goal scorer Jack Hughes and his 47 assists on the year.  They also have two skaters with 40 plus goals, Wyatt Johnston and Kirill Kaprizov.  And I don't think it will be that lopsided in hits and blocks for the Raisins this time.  The Puck have multiple players with 100 or more hits and 100 or more blocks.

This game will be close and I see the Raisins eeking out a win, preventing a repeat by the Puck.

The Space Monkey Mafia got past the Slapshots on a final shot.  This game was a tight one, with the game 3-3-1 going into Sunday night.  Unfortunately for the Slapshots, their Sabers players that really got them into the playoffs, let them down once they got there.  Josh Norris had no goals.  Tage Thomplson only had 1 goal and 1 assist and 1 PPP.  Goalie Alex Lyon had a SV% of .400!! Ouch!  But despite all that, they were still in the driver seat since they were the home team. But J.T. Miller put the dagger in the Slapshots heart with a power play assist tying PPP and winning the game for the Space Monkey Mafia 3-2-2!

What does the Space Monkey get for it's efforts?  A date with the top seed and juggernaut Assassins.  However the biggest news over the past few weeks was their loss of team MVP Leon Draisaitl.  He will be tough to replace, however Nick Suzuki can fill in as a leader in the face off circle as he has 68 assists on the season.  They have a solid blue line with 3 d-men with more than 100 blocks on the season.  

Another close ones sees the Assassins continuing their dominance on the league.  

CFHL Playoffs

 

The playoffs are upon us and the defending champs have a chance to defend their title!  They made a late season charge after a slow start to over take the Slapshots and Space Monkeys for first place in the Smythe Division and thus they get a bye in the first round of the playoffs.  Could they get their name on the trophy yet again?

The other bye and number 1 seed of course is the Assassins.  They pretty much steamed rolled the entire league all season long.  However just at the final weeks of the season they lost Leon Draisaitl for the season.  He led the team with 62 assists and 42 PPP not to mention 35 goals!  He will be tough to replace so it might not be that easy for the Assassins going forward.

So what does that leave?  That leaves 4 more teams that face off this week in the first round of the playoffs.  

Krampus Carols at California Raisins - The favorite here has to be the Raisins.  With Sid "The Kid" back and young phenom Macklin Celebrini they are pretty powerful upfront.  Tom Wilson can smash the boards too with 169 hits on the season.  And between Oettinger and Vejmelka they have a combined 63 wins.  The Krampus Carols do have some players too.  Nikita Kucherov can win a game all on his own.  However, the team lacks brutes on the boards and will likely lose both hits and blocks.  Vasilevskiy will need to win goalies on his own as well.  

Game is currently 4-2-1 in favor of Raisins as they have huge leads in Hits and Blocks and Celebrini already has 2 goals and 2 PPP so far this week.

Space Monkey Mafia at Buffalo Slapshots - Sabre games will be huge in this matchup.  Space Monkey have Alex Tuch and goalie Luukkonen while the Slapshots, to no one's surprise, have Josh Norris, Tage Thompson and Alex Lyon.  Lyon was on fire winning 6 in a row before giving up two in a row in a slight regression.  He will need to get back to that winning form.  This game will be close, and could be determined on who gets the puck in Buffalo.  However, Slapshots' secret weapon could be Cole Caufield who has 47 goals, 34 assists and 26 PPP on the season.

Currently the Slapshots have a 5-2 lead winning almost every category except blocks and goalie wins.  But it is a long way to go...