Playoff race starts Friday for Bees

HIDALGO — There’s not an official moment when the playoff race starts. For the Killer Bees, though, it starts in earnest Friday when they host Texas to start a three-game series with the Brahmas.

Texas (15-11-7) sits third in the Berry Conference, four points ahead of the fifth-place Bees (14-13-5), who are two points behind Tulsa for the conference’s fourth and final playoff spot.

“It’s something we have to start concentrating on more and more,” Bees coach Terry Ruskowski said. “We were thinking about it today (at practice).”

The Bees know that unlike last season when 16 of 18 teams made the postseason, there won’t be a backdoor to the playoffs. Last season, teams at or near .500 like this season’s Bees coasted into the playoffs and few games at this point of the year had much meaning.

That isn’t the case now. It’s possible, if not likely, that a team will finish above .500 and miss out on the playoffs.

To make sure that doesn’t happen to them, the Bees will need to beat teams near them like the Brahmas. And that starts this weekend with two games in Hidalgo and Sunday’s in North Richland Hills.

“It’s a tremendously big weekend for us,” Ruskowski said.

Friday’s game comes after an all-star break that wasn’t particularly well-timed for Ruskowski and the Bees. Their roster spent most of December in a state of flux as injuries, call-ups and a pair of defections hurt any sense of continuity.

“It’s tough because you always have to teach the new guys,” Ruskowski said. “They don’t capture in all of that and you have to keep reinforcing and keep telling them what to do and how to do it. And then when that guy does the job we bring another guy in and then do the same thing with that guy.

“Sometimes it’s work. No question.”

Save for a two-hour practice Thursday, the Bees didn’t have much time to skate together this week thanks to the all-star break, depriving them even more chances for work.

“I need time for my guys to practice. We’ve almost got some things organized and fit into place. We’ve got part one, but we haven’t got part two set up yet,” Ruskowski said. “If we want to keep the other team off balance we’ve got to have part one, part two and even part three to keep them off balance and keep them guessing.”

ICING: Aaron Lee on Sunday will play his 224th regular season game with the Bees, passing Ryan Shmyr for the most in franchise history. Lee did not practice Thursday after leaving Prescott Valley, Ariz. the site of Wednesday’s CHL All-Star Game, but he will be in the lineup Friday. … The Bees will wear special Harley Davidson-themed jerseys this weekend which will be auctioned off following Saturday night’s game.

Brian Sandalow covers the Rio Grande Valley Killer Bees for Valley Freedom Newspapers. You can reach him at (956) 683-4436 or via email at bsandalow@themonitor.com.