Battle underway for junior B roster
Coaches use pre-season games to help separate the contenders from the pretenders
After an off-season in which two franchises moved and an another opted to take a year off, the focus is back on hockey in junior B’s Golden Horseshoe Conference.
A little bit of everything has happened since the Listowel Cyclones of the Midwestern Conference swept the Caledonia Corvairs in the Greater Ontario Junior Hockey
League final to win to their Sutherland Cup.
There was something old, with the Ancaster Avalanche resurrecting the historic Hamilton Kilty B’s name and logo after a move to the Dave Andreychuk Mountain Arena; something new, with Pelham Meridian Community Centre replacing the smallest rink in the league and Ethan Moreau taking the coaching reins of the Fort Erie Meteors; as well as something borrowed, Lockport, N.Y., borrowing the Regals’ nickname from the team’s years in Buffalo.
There was also something blue, or not so blue, depending on whether Caledonia’s decision to go an hiatus for the 2018-19 season after capturing five conference championships in a row is a bad thing or a good thing.
To Welland Jr. Canadians head coach Keith Osborne, it’s neither.
“It means absolutely nothing,” says the
one-time NHLer who is returning for an eighth season as the team’s bench boss.
He suggests the only difference is that the season-long “dogfight” for first place will involve one less team.
St. Catharines Falcons head coach Frank Girhiny sees Caledonia’s departure as giving teams more hope heading into the season.
“Obviously, losing Caledonia from our conference is a blow, they are consistently the top team,” he says. “This should allow most teams to feel they have an opportunity to win more games.”
Thorold Blackhawks ownerhead coach Scott Barnes doesn’t regard the Corvairs staying on the sidelines as a game-changer for his team.
“Caledonia’s departure obviously means that other teams have a better chance of being at top of the league,” he says. “For us, we just try to focus on ourselves, and at the end of the end of the day this is a developmental league.
“Our players are here to get better every day.”
As far as the Niagara Falls Canucks are concerned, the Corvairs brought a lot to the table since moving to the Golden Horseshoe from the Midwest.
“Caledonia year after year was always one of, if not the best, team in junior B hockey,” says Canucks owner-head coach Frank Pietrangelo. They were a great measuring stick for all of us, and were a solid draw at the gate — fans liked to watch the level of hockey they brought and the quality of the games against them.
“Having said this, the GHC remains very strong and competitive, with or without Caledonia.”
Top priorities
Pietrangelo’s top priority at the main training camp getting
underway this week is two-fold.
“First of all, to finalize our roster by adding the final missing pieces, and secondly to start finding the right chemistry in the room and on the on-the-ice combinations for lines, D pairings, etc.”
Right behind that is finding a replacement for Frank Pucci — and the 42 goals he scored — in his final year of junior eligibility.
Team chemistry also tops the lesson plan at the Falcons camp now underway at Seymour-Hannah Sports and Entertainment Centre, and at auditions for sports on the Blackhawks roster.
“No. 1 priority is to find players who are willing to compete day in day out, and are willing to play the Falcons way,” Girhiny says. “Hopefully, the two weeks of training camp along with our four exhibition games, we can carve out a team that will be successful this upcoming season.”
Thorold’s top priority, Barnes says, is “teaching our guys the way we are going to play this year.”
“Working on our structures and habits.”
No. 1 job for Welland’s coaching staff is to replacing players
who want to move to leagues under the junior A umbrella.
“Every year is a rebuilding year,” Osborne says. “I had 14 kids eligible to return from last year, but they all want to go to a higher division, which is good.
“That’s my job, to move them up, to make them better.”
The playing’s the thing
Practice makes perfect, but only competition can separate the contenders from pretenders.
That’s why teams in the Golden Horseshoe emphasize exhibition games as part of their player-assessment process at training camp.
“You can have all the talent in the world, but if you don’t want to go to the front of the net or into the corners first, then you probably can’t play junior B hockey,” suggests Osborne.
Pietrangelo agrees exhibition games are the best way “to truly evaluate the prospects.”
“Once the puck’s dropped and the competitive juices start flowing, you really see who’s who.”
The onetime NHL goaltender and Stanley Cup winner with the 1991 Pittsburgh Penguins won’t get any arguments from Girhiny or Barnes on that score.
“Exhibition games are very important to evaluate players who want to be Falcons,” says Girhiny, “This gives the coaches an opportunity to evaluate how a player plays under pressure, and at top speed.”
Thorold’s pre-season games play a big role in determining who makes the final cut.
“We didn’t bring in a lot of extra bodies to camp, so the ones who are here have the potential to crack the lineup,” says Barnes. “These five exhibition games will decide who stays.”
Pelham Panthers head coach Mark Barrick, whose team has already played three exhibition games, prefers to see how players compete in games before finalizing a roster.
"There have been great practice players,” he says. “On the other hand, you get guys that are very average in a practice, but every single night they bring it all, and they're always one of the best and most noticeable guys on the ice during a game.
‘‘ “Once the puck’s dropped and the competitive juices start flowing, you really see who’s who.” FRANK PIETRANGELO Niagara Falls Canucks owner-head coach