PADDOCK ON PATS
GM liking what he sees
John Paddock’s view of the Regina Pats may have changed, but his opinion of them hasn’t.
Paddock is watching the WHL club from a different vista this season as he transitions to a full-time GM while former assistant coach Dave Struch takes over behind the bench.
Regardless of his perspective, Paddock has yet to see anything that would alter his firm belief that Regina should be in the playoff conversation this season.
“I’m expecting us to be very competitive,” offered Paddock, whose team opens the regular season Friday in Prince Albert. “I like basically everything I’ve seen so far. That’s referring to them as a team and what Dave is carrying over and what he is tweaking or doing a little bit differently. We don’t have any complaints. In saying that, when the bullets start flying for real, it’s different. We’re going to have to be better still and we’ll see where we’re at.”
Struch is determined to establish a team identity based upon an unrelenting work ethic. That’s not a new concept, but it is a necessity after the Pats graduated several high-end players from the team that reached the final of the 2018 Memorial Cup in Regina.
“You always need to be hardworking,” noted Paddock. “I’m not saying you can or can’t use that as part of your identity, but that’s part of what they’ve bought into. They have worked hard at it.
“It’s easier to get pure hard work out of people that don’t have the high-end skill. We were fortunate in that we had people like (Sam) Steel and (Adam) Brooks who worked. But I think that’s the identity that has been established.”
Paddock and Struch worked hard over the previous four seasons to build a squad that played a fast-paced, puck-possession game. They’re expected to go about it a little differently this season, but some of the basic principles still apply.
“We’re in the midst of continuing to play fast like we have emphasized all along,” said Paddock, whose team will play a lot more chip-and-chase than run-and-gun this season.
The latter requires a mix of speed, execution and commitment.
So far, so good.
“The players that we had a lot of question marks on when we had exit meetings on June 1, they’ve pretty well all trended the right way,” said Paddock. “That’s a good sign for us. If they had all gone the other way it would be disastrous.
“On June 1 we didn’t know what Europeans we were getting. We got two kids (Russian forward Sergei Alkhimov and defenceman Nikita Sedov) who were at the Hlinka tryouts. Then they made the team and we saw them (in person). They’re going to have little blips, but it looks like they’re (contributing) players. That’s pretty big for us.”
The same goes for some other newcomers.
“(Rookie forwards) Garrett Wright and Carter Massier have been fine to good to very good some nights in the exhibition,” continued Paddock. “They have speed. They have brains. They’re going to allow us to play a fast offensive game. They’re going to be quite a bit better at Christmas and January and they’re going to be quite a bit better again next year because they’re only 17.”
That also applies to Logan Nijhoff, one of the team’s most promising young forwards. The youngest of the bunch is top prospect Cole Dubinsky, who’s close to returning from an ankle injury that kept him out of training camp.
“He’s 16, but we always felt he was going to be able to play this year and hold his own,” said Paddock. “Then (veteran) players like (Austin) Pratt and (Koby) Morrisseau — especially in Austin’s case — have come back in enormously better condition. (Rookie defenceman) Ryker Evans, we didn’t know where he was going to be for sure. It looks like he’s going to be on the team.
“Our question marks have been answered to date. There’s going to be slippage, but it’s the right trend so it’s allowing us a little bit more optimism. We’re feeling good about how competitive we can be.”
Our question marks have been answered to date ...We’re feeling good about how competitive we can be.
JOHN PADDOCK, above