Taking care of business once again
Bottom feeders no longer, Kamloops Blazers return to respectability on and off ice
From their three Memorial Cup championships in the early and mid- 1990s, to years of losing, in- house squabbling, dressing room divide and dwindling fan attendance, the Kamloops Blazers have experienced a whirlwind that has spanned three long decades.
Once hailed as the model junior hockey franchise in North America, following Memorial Cup wins in 1992, 1994 and 1995 — more than qualifying them as a junior hockey dynasty — the Blazers suddenly fell on hard times, including a case in which their former office manager Maxine Patrick was charged with fraud and theft over $ 5,000 for embezzling nearly $ 1 million, beginning in the mid- 90s.
She pleaded guilty to fraud and was sentenced in 2006 to 3 ½ years in federal prison.
That may have been the most alarming case, and it was office.
But Murphy’s Law – “if anything can go wrong, it will” – applied to the team’s on- ice performance as well.
Since the 2001- 02 campaign, the Blazers have endured four losing seasons and have yet to win a playoff round in their last eight playoff appearances.
The Blazer bench once occupied by WHL legends Ken Hitchcock, Tom Renney and Don Hay turned into an assembly line of sorts, collecting and discarding a total of seven different coaches from 2000 to 2009.
Even an ownership change in 2007 — Tom Gaglardi, also now the owner of the NHL’S Dallas Stars, and several former Blazers in Shane Doan, Jarome Iginla, Mark Recchi and Darryl Sydor all came on board – and a front office overhaul that included former Vancouver Giants assistant GM and assistant coach Craig Bonner taking over as vice- president and general manager in 2008 was not enough to immediately stop the bleeding.
Things reached a low- point last season. The Blazers finished with a 29- 37- 3- 3 record and failed to make the playoffs. The dressing room was divided, and Kamloops Daily News sports editor Gregg Drinnan was banned from talking with team personnel, apparently because his commentary on the team had become too negative.
The ban was eventually rescinded. But the drama that unfolded symbolized a point in which the Blazers seemed further away from their celebrated past than ever before.
“When I got the job here about three years ago, the mandate was to rebuild,” said Bonner.
“Our protected list [ of players] wasn’t great. The depth in the organization wasn’t great. The culture was bad, and it took time. We had to make some player moves, some personnel moves and the biggest thing is we were patient and we stuck with it.”
The Blazers leading scorer this season, 19- year- old Brendan Ranford, openly acknowledged a divisive factor in the lockerroom in previous seasons, a statement of fact Bonner agreed with.
Things have changed drastically in 2011- 12. The Blazers have re- ignited that winning formula, which led to their three championships in four years. On the strength of a three- point night – including two goals – from Ranford and a 33- save effort from Cole Cheveldave, Kamloops ousted the Tri- City Americans 5- 1 on Wednesday at home.
The win gives the Blazers a 38- 12- 1- 3 record and a fourpoint cushion on the secondplace Americans for top spot in the WHL Western Conference.
The Blazers, in action at home Friday against the Kelowna Rockets, also lead the Edmonton Oil Kings by two points for first overall in the WHL, and are ranked second in the Canadian Hockey League, behind the OHL’S London Knights.
So, what changed? Ranford, who has 31 goals and 67 points in 51 games with Kamloops this season and has been with the Blazers since they took him in the first round of the 2007 WHL Bantam Draft, seems to have the answer.
“I would probably say the biggest thing is we’re just a team, we’re together and we don’t really have any cliques,” said Ranford.
“You come to the rink and you feel like your brothers are beside you and they’ll stick up for you whenever something is going wrong. It’s a good feeling. It’s a great place to play hockey. Kamloops has such a rich tradition with the Memorial Cups and the many players that have come out of here and it’s a good feeling now that we’re winning. The town is behind us.”
Those fans, at least from accounts within the organization, are slowly coming back. Attendance has been in steady decline since 2001- 02, when the team averaged roughly 5,400 fans per game, having gradually fallen 24 per cent over the last 10 seasons.
“When things are going good, that’s great, but when things aren’t, you feel the heat,” said Bonner, adding the Blazers now average roughly 4,000 fans a game — they had 4,346 inside the Interior Savings Centre on Wednesday.
“Our fan base has dropped. It’s starting to come back, and winning does that.”
The Blazers finished the 200102 season first in the Western Conference, but were swept in the first round by the Rockets.
Since 2002, they have made it to the playoffs eight times, won just five games in that time, haven’t made it out of the first round since 1999, and have been swept in their last four playoff appearances.
“I’ve been around hockey long enough that playoffs are a totally different thing,” said Blazers head coach Guy Charron, an NHL veteran of 734 games spanning 12 seasons who was hired on Nov. 23, 2009.
“You just never know what circumstances may occur. I don’t like to look at the long- term picture. For me, it’s realizing what we’re doing, what we’ve done and continue to do what we’re doing and we’ll see what happens at the end of the year.”
But there’s no getting around how important a Memorial Cup — or at least a prolonged playoff run — would mean to the city of Kamloops.
“Getting to the Memorial Cup and playing in the Memorial Cup arguably is as hard as any sports trophy to win and get to,” said Bonner, who won a championship as a player in 1992, and with the Vancouver Giants in 2007.
“The city was very, very fortunate, and now they probably realize it more than anything, to win that trophy three out of four years, it may never happen again ... Everyone knows there are high expectations here.”