Hoefenmayer caps remarkable junior run
67’s star wins Kaminsky award as OHL’s top defenceman
While now no franchise can boast as many Max Kaminsky Trophy winners as the 67’s, it’s hard to imagine any OHL defenceman ever again having a season quite like Ottawa’s Denis Potvin did in winning for the second straight time in 1972-73.
In the 61 games heading into an NHL amateur draft that saw him selected No. 1 overall by the New York Islanders, the Hull product scored 35 goals, 88 assists and 123 points, despite spending a whopping 232 minutes in the penalty box.
Yeah, it’s tough to fathom a similar stats line again in any league, but then Potvin was a special player who went on to become one of the best blueliners to ever play the game.
Almost 50 years later, what Noel Hoefenmayer accomplished to become Ottawa’s most recent Kaminsky winner was pretty impressive in its own right.
On Wednesday, Hoefenmayer was the eighth 67’s player to be declared the OHL’s most outstanding defenceman after a season in which he produced 26 goals, 82 points and a plus-52 rating over just 58 games.
Among that prestigious list of juniors to play in the nation’s capital, only Potvin had more goals and only Brian Campbell had more points, with 87 in 62 games in 1998-99. Current day Boston Bruins coach Bruce Cassidy lit the lamp 27 times in 67 games during the 1983-84 season, but it wasn’t enough to earn him more Kaminsky votes than teammate Brad Shaw.
Hoefenmayer led all OHL defenceman in scoring with six more points than Ryan Merkley of the
London Knights, a first-round pick of the San Jose Sharks.
“I was never really focused throughout the year on winning the defenceman of the year, (or) being the leader in points,” Hoefenmayer, a 21-year old North York native who enjoyed one of the best five-season 67’s careers ever, said during a Zoom call with reporters.
“Sometimes it can creep into the back of your mind, but my goals weren’t really that to start the year, and throughout the year I tried not to focus on that too much. (Otherwise) it would kind of let my game slip away from where I was trying to build my game, and how I wanted to play.”
No, Hoefenmayer’s goals were something else. They were twofold: He wanted to help the 67’s get to the Memorial Cup, and he wanted to earn himself a job in the pros after the Arizona Coyotes chose not to sign him as their fourth round pick in 2017.
In other words, he had plenty of motivation.
“I think that sometimes the long road builds stronger people,” said Hoefenmayer, who signed a twoyear contract with the AHL’s Toronto Marlies last month. “Just going through everything I’ve been through to this point, it’s helped my career drastically and motivated me way more to push myself to different levels than I’ve ever really pushed to before.
“I’d say it’s a blessing in disguise, the way my path has kind of played out so far. Hopefully I can continue on and play in the NHL.”
Of course, the dark cloud on a sunny afternoon was the reminder that Wednesday, the OHL champions were scheduled to fly to Kelowna, B.C. for the 102nd Memorial Cup major junior championship After a regular season in which they were the top ranked team in Ontario and the No. 2 squad in the country, the 67’s believe they would have been westward bound if the Memorial Cup hadn’t been cancelled due to the coronavirus pandemic.
“It would have been something special to be in Kelowna this week,” said Hoefenmayer.
“From last year, the way it ended (a loss in the OHL final to the Guelph Storm) and what we had in mind this year, how we wanted the season to go, it’s definitely unfortunate that it ended the way it did. But what’s happening in the world is bigger than hockey. We have to deal with this all together and flatten the curve and social distance, and hopefully we can all get through this.”
While the 67’s will always feel cheated by fate, the season they enjoyed was very special. Along with the OHL’s defenceman of the year, they boasted the overager of the year (Austen Keating), the coach of the year (Andre Tourigny) and the league’s leading scorer (Marco Rossi), who should also should be awarded the Red Tilson Trophy as the OHL’s most outstanding player/MVP.
Hoefenmayer leaves after playing 298 games, the most ever by a 67’s defenceman.