Champs preaching patience, at least early in the season
Spitfires have 14 new faces in the lineup after capturing Memorial Cup last spring
What a difference a year makes.
A year ago, expectations were high for the Windsor Spitfires, with the club slated to host the 99th MasterCard Memorial Cup.
Now, after a record-setting performance to win the title, the Spitfires are set to open the regular season Thursday against the Saginaw Spirit with 14 new players on the roster. Game time at the WFCU Centre is 7:05 p.m.
“It’s going to be a little bit different,” Spitfires captain Aaron Luchuk said. “Last year’s expectations were through the roof from the opening puck drop.
“This team, I don’t even know if there are expectations. It’s kind of an open book. It’s a different team from last year, but I still think expectations will be high.”
With so many new faces in the lineup, the key word with this club will be patience. There must be patience with the young players to allow them to get their feet wet in the league. There must be patience while older players grow into expanded roles. There also has to be patience to allow time for the group to come together and bond.
“I’m not the most patient guy, but this is going to require patience,” Spitfires general manager Warren Rychel said.
Trevor Letowski, the Spitfires’ first-year head coach, and his staff have plenty of teaching to do, but he likes the group assembled.
“For me, it’s a process,” Letowski said. “We really need to be dialed into that. We need to come to the rink and find a way to get this group
better and hopefully get some results along the way. Really push the work ethic.
“It’s an exciting time and I like the group and its eagerness. For a coach, you don’t always get that.”
The only position where there is a clear strength for the team is in net, where Mike DiPietro, an OHL all-star last season and the top goalie at the Memorial Cup, enters his third season.
“I think patience should definitely be a theme, but it shouldn’t be a crutch or something we always rely on,” said DiPietro, who will have Brock Baier or Lucas Patton as his backups. “It’ll be a process more than anything. I, myself, and I know the older players and Warren (Rychel) and Lewts (Letowski), are definitely impatient people because we all like to win.
“So, I think that’s something that will fuel us for this year, but with the learning and teaching aspect, I think you have to be patient when it comes to those areas.”
On defence, Tyler Nother and overager Austin McEneny return and the club has hopes for former top pick Connor Corcoran, who will move into a full-time role on defence in his second season.
After that, there’s plenty of questions with first-round pick Nathan Staios, second pick Louka Henault, Russian import pick Lev Starikov and Thomas Stevenson filling out the rotation.
“It’s just going to be a totally different feel to defence,” Letowski said. “We don’t have that top four (like last season) that we can just roll over.”
Unless the club gets Logan Brown and Gabriel Vilardi back at some point, Luchuk is the only proven goal scorer. Luchuk, who scored the game-winning goal in May’s Memorial Cup final, had 28 goals last season and 27 the year before that.
Windsor is hoping Igor Larionov, Joseph Mizzi and Jake Smith, who all played in the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League, can provide some offence along with Luke Kutkevicius, who was acquired from Hamilton.
“It’s a little bit of a theme to our group,” Letowski said. “Not a lot of experience scoring goals at this level, but also the theme is they haven’t had that opportunity.”
Third-year forward Luke Boka and second-year forward Cole Purboo both have to take another step forward, along with Chris Playfair and Tyler Angle, who both move into full-time roles.
Matthew MacDougall was a highly touted acquisition from Barrie and the club also has high hopes for Russian import pick Kirill Kozhevnikov. The club will also break in rookie William Sirman and Daniel D’Amico.
“I think we’ll be fine,” Luchuk said. “I think we’ve got a good group of forwards.
“You always want to be the top dog. Obviously, that’s not the case, but I think what we’ve got in that room is going to surprise a lot of teams.”