HOCKEY NIGHT … IN BROOKS
Inside the phenomenon that’s best Junior A team in Canada
It’s Sunday — a game day — and Ryan Papaioannou is in his office early with an extra large Tim Hortons coffee in hand.
The head coach is discussing ways the Brooks Bandits can improve, chatting about their ridiculous record (28-1), their Canadian Junior Hockey League ranking (No. 1), and their league-record win streak (20) which set the tone for 2012-13.
Until Willy knocks on the door.
“You guys have been winning lots, I heard,” chirps the 40-something assistant trainer, eyes lit up.
“Yeah buddy,” Papaioannou says, grinning. “But we lost one. We’ll forget about it though, eh?” The exchange continues.
“Are we going to win another one?” Willy asks.
Keep in mind, Willy Coe has lived and breathed Bandits hockey longer than anyone can remember. He is mentally challenged and works at the recycling plant in town but never misses a game or a practice. He’s always in a good mood, always the first one to address the room after games. He’s their guy.
So, Willy knows the answer to this question. Everyone does.
Because, almost comically, victories have become the norm in this southeast Alberta town.
“People expect us to win,” says Papaioannou, who is into his fifth year with the Bandits and fourth as the team’s head coach. “They expect us to be good. We’ve heard fans say they don’t come to the games anymore because they already know what’s going to happen. Older fans say, ‘What’s the point on getting bundled up and coming down to the rink because we know what’s going to happen.’
“Sure, we’ve played some home games that haven’t been that close. And maybe it’s not that entertaining hockey to watch … But, I mean, I’d rather have that than the alternative.”
Which was the case at one point in the team’s 13-season existence in the AJHL.
But not for the past two campaigns — and especially not this moment.
Goals have been scored at a torrid pace in the team’s first 29 games of the sea- son and, as such, six of the league’s top-10 scorers wear Bandits sweaters. With 148 goals for, their differential is an impressive 93. Sunday evening, they smashed the Whitecourt Wolverines 9-1 and on Tuesday somehow managed a 4-3 shootout win over the Olds Grizzlys even though Olds scored two times in the final 40 seconds to send the game into overtime.
Brooks has only lost once this season. Yet the work continues.
“We win 20 games in a row and we’re still doing video and going over games we win 9-1,” said Bandits captain Cam Maclise and leading scorer, outside Sunday’s jubilant post-game dressing room. “They’re pointing out mistakes and things we need to improve. We’re just trying to get better every night.”
The club stormed the 2012 post-season with a franchise-best record of 477-6 and 100 points. For the first time, they captured the AJHL’s Enerflex Cup; proof is on the wall beside Papaioannou’s desk in a framed photo of the team along with their final game sheet.
Off-ice, they’re better off financially than they’ve been in a while with a surplus of $191,626 at the 2011-12 season’s end (a significant increase from $5,998 the previous year). Business is good.
But, on the ice, it was an abrupt end to a storybook season when they lost out to the eventual CJHL champion Penticton Vees in four games, explaining their jump out of the gates this season.
And at the moment, they’re envy of the league, the team to beat, and everyone knows it.
“That something that never changes,” said Camrose Kodiaks head coach and general manager Boris Rybalka, the architect of one of the best CJHL programs in the country. “When Spruce Grove won a couple years in a row, everyone wants to beat Spruce. Camrose. Fort Mac. Now everyone wants to beat Brooks. So, you do know that’s going through everyone’s minds when they play you.”
Camrose has long been a powerhouse and one of the AJHL’s model franchises — in fact, Camrose’s board and Bandits president Dave Hemsing shares ideas regularly.
“The model isn’t only on ice, it’s off-ice,” Rybalka said. “How professional you are. How you perceive yourself. It’s a big thing. Wherever you go, you’re noticed. It doesn’t matter what you do, you’re under the microscope … people know the Kodiaks name, the Oil Barons, the Brooks Bandits now. Once you’ve been there, at the top, it never leaves.
“People always expect you to carry yourselves a certain way and be professional.”
Especially in such a small community where interaction with the fan base is crucial. An average of 1,091 consistently show up to the relatively new Centennial Regional Arena which became the Bandits’ new team-coloured blue-andred home in 2010. It’s an 18 per cent increase and fourth in league attendance behind Grande Prairie, Fort McMurray, and Camrose, respectively.
Last year, during playoffs, the facility was packed — and loud. People had house parties and watched road games on the AJHL’s payper-view system. The team also had a Bandits-themed (strawberry-filled, vanilla iced) game-day doughnut at Tim Hortons and an ice cream flavour, “The Bandito,” (strawberry and bubble gum ice cream, strawberries, gummy bears and chocolate sprinkles) at Cold Stone Creamery.
Truth be told, not everyone cares as much as Willy does in Brooks, a town of almost 14,000 people (or around 30,000 if you in- clude the surrounding rural communities).
But the ones that care, care a lot.
“You can’t go anywhere without people talking to you or know they’re talking about you,” Papaioannou said. “If you go to the grocery store, you say ‘Hi’ 25 times. Everyone else you can see are like, ‘There’s the Bandits coach.’”
And, not surprisingly, the players — who range from ages 16 to 21 — get the same treatment when they wander around town in their Bandits-issued red track suits.
“In Calgary, everyone plays minor hockey,” said 18-year-old Patrick Lee, a transplanted Calgarian who is in his second season with the club. “You’re just another person playing hockey. But here, you’re like a mini celebrity. That’s a lot different. It’s like playing for the Hitmen in Calgary or, lesser extent, the Flames. It’s nice like that, people know you.
“You go to Tim Hortons, they know who you are … it seems like home now.”
Which is an interesting concept in itself.
How can one possibly sell the bright lights of Brooks, better known more for its’ agricultural, oil and gas, and the doom and gloom E.coli recall from the Lakeside Packers beef-processing plant? (For the record, downtown does feature a one-screen theatre but it only plays one movie at a time. FYI, there’s 7 p.m. and 9:15 p.m. showings of Red Dawn tonight.)
“People used to always tell me, ‘Oh yeah, it’s been tough for the coaches to recruit because nobody wants to come to Brooks,’” Papaioannou said. “Really? I don’t buy that.”
“It’s just another small town, I love it … people say it smells bad. Yeah, it does but only one in a while. It’s not like it’s like that every day.”
So when it comes to recruiting players, like any junior hockey program at any level, it’s usually about convincing parents first about what their program — the No. 1 team in the country, mind you — can offer in terms of hockey and education.
Most players travelling down the AJHL/Tier II junior road are interested in nabbing NCAA scholarships, something that isn’t possible in the Western Hockey League and some- thing that attracted Madison Dunn, a 17-year-old forward from Calgary that was called up from the midget ‘AAA’ Flames.
“We had some pretty long talks with Madison about being among a group of guys that are just here to live and breathe hockey. But he has to live and breathe hockey AND go to school,” said Madison’s mother Tani collie who is a teacher. “It’s about striking that balance. We liked how close it was (in Brooks). We talked about it being maybe not an ideal place to live. But he’s so keen just about the hockey that overrides everything else.”
The passion and theme is similar in the Bandits’ dressing room.
“You do the same things you do with your teammates anywhere that you would do here,” Papaioannou said. “It’s not like you’re in Seattle, taking in the arts. You’re with the guys, practising, going to a movie. You’re coming to play hockey. If you’re looking for a fancy city that has all these different amenities, feel free — you’re not the right guy for us at all.
“Our guys are here to work out. Our guys are here to practice. Our guys are here to play.”