The Draft is on Tap

This week the Western Hockey League will hold its annual Bantam Draft as the 22 teams will choose the stars of tomorrow.  The Seattle Thunderbirds will have three of the top 35 picks.  They choose tenth overall in round one and will have two selections in round two.  They have the 32nd pick which is their own, and the 34th pick, a selection they acquired from Medicine Hat in the Elijah Brown deal.

The T-Birds do not have a third round pick.  That belongs to Swift Current.  It was the price Seattle paid two years ago to acquire goaltender Landon Bow at the 2016 WHL trade deadline. At the time of the trade it was a conditional second rounder going back to the Broncos.  Apparently the conditions weren't met and it reverted to a third round choice.

Bow of course would help lead Seattle to the WHL Championship series that year against Brandon, a series they would lose in five games. Seattle would return to the WHL Championship last spring and claim the Chynoweth Cup for the first time in franchise history, besting Regina in six games.  Once again Seattle surrendered a third round pick to help strengthen their team for the playoffs.  They acquired defenseman Aaron Hyman from Calgary.  But that third round pick was originally Price Albert's, one Seattle got in the Cavin Leth trade.

Now, there were other deals made along the way to improve the T-Birds roster for their two runs to the league final, but the highest price they paid in both instances was a third round draft pick, one of which wasn't even their own.  I emphasize that point to make this point; the best way to build a championship caliber team is through the Bantam Draft.  I'm not saying it is the only way, I'm saying it is the best way.

Look at three of the four teams remaining in the postseason heading into the week of April 30th.  Everett, Swift Current and Tri-City paid steep prices for their deep playoff runs.  At a minimum, all gave up at least one first round bantam draft pick. All three gave away young prospects. Other teams, who have since been eliminated from the postseason, paid big prices for a shot at the holy grail too.  Teams like Portland, Regina, Victoria and Moose Jaw all made splashy trades at the deadline that cost them either first rounders or young prospects and in most cases both.  A year ago it was Prince George selling the farm for a chance at the Cup.  Meanwhile in two runs to the Chynoweth Cup Finals Seattle never sent their first rounder, or for that matter their second round pick, away in a trade. They didn't mortgage the future. Because they drafted well, they didn't need to.

You could argue Seattle lost first rounders along the way too.  That is true but it wasn't because of a deal to help them win their first ever WHL title.  Seattle had two first round picks in 2013 but neither of them made an impact on the team.  Defenseman Dante Fabbro never signed, foregoing the WHL for the NCAA.  Winger Kaden Elder was with the team until being dealt to Swift Current in December of 2015 in exchange for Owen Seidel.  That trade was made to accommodate a dissatisfied 17 year old Elder who was not happy with his ice time on Seattle's fourth line.  Unfortunately Seidel, after a promising start with the T-Birds, got hurt and retired from the game just before the start of the 2016-17 season.

Again a disagreement over ice time led the T-Birds to trade 2015 first round bantam pick Elijah Brown this winter to Medicine Hat in exchange for a second and a third round draft pick but Brown was still on the roster for their Championship win.

Of the players on Seattle's Cup winning team, 17 of 24 were either drafted or listed by the T-Birds.  14 were bantam draft choices, two were import picks and one, Scott Eansor was a listed player.  Ten of those players were selected in either the first or second round of their bantam drafts.  Two were first round Import Draft selections.  I'm no math expert, and I'm sure someone out there will point that out to me after reading this, but I believe that is about 66 percent of that roster coming out of the bantam draft and 42 percent of the championship roster built through the first two rounds.  The draft is key!

The players they acquired in trade?  Hyman, Turner Ottenbreit, Rylan Toth, Tyler Adams, Austin Strand, Anthony Bishop and Zack Andrusiak.  Only two of those players they traded for cost Seattle a draft pick, Hyman and Toth.  You could argue though that the acquisition of Hyman really was at the expense of Leth.  Remember before the start of the 2016-17 season Seattle traded Leth to Prince Albert for Andursiak and a third round pick, then sent the third round pick to Calgary in January 2017 for Hyman. 

In a January trade with Regina T-Birds GM Russ Farwell turned Hyman into a 2019 second round pick and young defenseman Owen Williams.   The T-Birds also got a draft pick back in the Strand trade, acquiring the defenseman in December of 2016 along with a sixth round pick from Red Deer for Brandon Schuldhaus.

Four years of Ottenbreit was acquired from Saskatoon for a few months of 20-year old Adam Henry.  Seattle sent prospect Mackenzie Wight to Swift Current for Adams.  Acquiring Toth and having a young Carl Stankowski made former third round pick Logan Flodell expendable prior to last season.  He was dealt to Saskatoon for Bishop.  Bishop subsequently was dealt to Victoria for Blake Bargar.

In the past I've mentioned how Seattle has found gems late in the draft.  Recently graduated out Donovan Neuls being a prime example.  There have been others such as current defenseman Reece Harsch or even a guy like Lane Pederson, a former fifth rounder who spend most of his WHL career with Swift Current.  Plain and simple though, Seattle built their Chynoweth Cup winner specifically through the top of the draft, then didn't sacrifice future drafts to supplement it. 

Which brings us to this week and the 2018 WHL Bantam Draft.  Three picks in the top 35.  A draft that, if you listen to those in the know, may not have tremendous superstar power throughout, but is thought to have tremendous depth. 

Three picks in the top 35 doesn't guarantee success.  Twice recently Seattle had a similar scenario.  In 2012 they ended up with Barzal, Kolesar and Bear.  In 2013 they selected Fabbro, Elder and Nolan Volcan.  You might rush to say in one instance it worked out and in another they fell a bit short.  I will argue they got the picks right in both instances.  At the time of the 2013 draft they had no way of knowing Fabbro would spurn them for the NCAA or that Elder would ask for a trade two years later, primarily because Seattle had a team full of older, quality forwards.

No one bats a thousand but the T-Birds have made more contact then not when they swing away at the draft recently.  Four of those six players mentioned are now NHL draft picks and two of them, Barzal and Fabbro were first round NHL selections. Barzal and Bear are already in the NHL with Barzal soon to be named the NHL's Calder Trophy winner as 2017-18 NHL Rookie of the Year. 

Kolesar, property of the NHL's Las Vegas Golden Knights,  just finished a strong season in the AHL with the Chicago Wolves. Volcan, will be the T-Birds captain next year and is on the path to earning a pro deal. He's already been to and had a solid NHL camp with Pittsburgh.  Meanwhile Elder is currently helping Swift Current as they chase a WHL Championship.  Let's also not forget that Seattle's first round pick before those two drafts, 2011's Ryan Gropp was drafted into the NHL, and their first round pick after those two drafts, 2014's Jarret Tyszka, was as well.

The scouts have done their work. If the T-Birds can have similar success with their first three picks later this week, they will be well on their way to continuing to build upon the culture of winning they have created. Remember too, not only does Seattle have three selections in the top 35 picks this year, but next spring, barring trades, Seattle could potentially have five picks in the first three rounds.  That includes their own first, second and third round choices, plus Regina's second rounder obtained in the Hyman trade and a conditional third rounder from Medicine Hat acquired in the Brown deal.  So Seattle conceivably will end up with eight players from the top of the next two bantam drafts.  That could constitute the core of a championship contender.

The Coaching Game

When Steve Konowalchuk took the reins as Seattle's head coach nearly seven years ago, one of the reasons he cited for accepting the position was the chance to work with and develop raw, young players into professionals.  Working with the younger players in the Colorado Avalanche system was something he had done a little of while on that staff of the NHL team.  Coming to Seattle allowed him to do it full-time.

He was pretty good at it too.  Mat Barzal was going to be an NHL player but Konowalchuk showed  him that talent alone was not enough.  In conversations with media at various times during his rookie season with the New York Islanders this past year Barzal often cited the influence of Konowalchuk on his total game.

Barzal was the no brainer in the group though, almost pegged as a surefire NHLer before Kono even arrived in Seattle.  Konowalchuk's biggest fingerprint might be on guys like Scott Eansor and Alexander True, a couple of undrafted players who signed AHL deals.  Like Barzal he showed them as well that it takes more then talent to make it at hockey's highest level.  He instilled a work ethic in them that says you can't cut corners.

In his last four years behind the Seattle bench, Konowalchuk had a secret weapon to help him in developing those players.  that secret weapon was Matt O'Dette.  O'Dette too had his influence on those players.  As the primary assistant coach, he was in charge of the defensemen. Two of them, Shea Theodore and Ethan Bear, earned WHL Defenseman of the Year honors under his tutelage.  Both were drafted into the NHL and both are now NHLers.  Then there is Austin Strand, recently signed by the NHL's L.A. Kings, and Turner Ottenbreit who has hooked on with the AHL's San Antonio Rampage (Colorado Avalanche affiliate) for the end of their season.  O'Dette has had a significant impact on the development of their game as well and it continued after Konowalchuk left.  

O'Dette also was responsible for the penalty kill under Kono and Seattle's PK has been fairly consistently a top ten penalty kill team in the WHL over that span, often in the top five.  So, O'Dette had cache before he took over for Konowalchuk behind the bench this season.  So how did he do bringing all that out in the open his first year at the helm?

Let's start with this, in the end coaches are always going to be judged by wins and losses.  In his first  season O'Dette took a team devoid of the star players it had the previous four campaigns and led them to a 34-28-8-2 record and into the first round of the playoffs.  It's one season but he had them playing winning hockey. You can check that box in his favor.

He accomplished that record with a staff lacking in coaching experience.  The only guy standing behind the T-birds bench with any previous coaching on his resume when this season began was O'Dette.  His two assistants were coaching neophytes.  The previous season both Kyle Hagel and Castan Sommer were still pro hockey players.  So O'Dette wasn't just coaching the players, he was also coaching up the coaches.  He had a hand in picking his assistants then integrating them into his systems. 

Personally, I think it went seamlessly.  First, it appears he picked the right guys.  Both Hagel and Sommer are enthusiastic, fresh voices who can smartly articulate the message to the players.  In retrospect I think it was a good idea to get two guys just entering the coaching profession to work with a roster featuring a lot of young players pushing their way onto the Thunderbirds roster for the first time. Guys like Sam Huo, Holden Katzalay, Payton Mount and Graeme Bryks are the recipients of that new positive energy Hagel and Sommer are bringing.   Would it have worked with a more veteran roster featuring NHL drafted players like Barzal, Bear, Kolesar and Gropp?   I'm not so sure.

As we know, O'Dette's first year as head coach featured a roster with no Barzal, no Bear, no Kolesar, no Gropp, no Eansor and no True.  He had some solid returning vets in Ottenbreit, Strand, Donovan Neuls, and Nolan Volcan but when the year started he had just one NHL draft pick on the roster, Montreal Canadiens fifth rounder Jarett Tyszka.  Eventually Strand would sign his deal with the Kings but that would be it. Then at the midseason trade deadline Seattle dealt away 19 year old defenseman Aaron Hyman and not long after that 18 year old d-man Reece Harsch went down with injury and missed 19 games.  All of a sudden Seattle was dressing three rookie defenseman every night.  Did they take some lumps?  Sure they did but O'Dette and his staff kept them glued together well enough to get that postseason spot.

The goaltending situation has been well documented too.  Look, when you come into your first year as head coach thinking the one position you don't have to worry about is goaltending and it ends up being the position you worry about the most, it would be easy to panic. Instead O'Dette handed the job to whoever was healthy that night and put faith not just in them, but the team around them until he could settle on a number one guy.  The coach believed in his players and that gave them the ability to believe in themselves.  To paraphrase the late, great Yogi Berra, hockey is ninety percent mental and the other half is physical.  A good coach recognizes that.

At the end of the day there is no way you can look back on this past season and say this team underachieved.  If anything most pundits and fans would say the team surpassed what they thought they would have accomplished.  It was a transition year that, frankly, I think went better then expected.  You knew they would be integrating in a lot of young rookies but to do it and still finish above .500 and in the postseason is a win-win.

If you're still not sold on Matt O'Dette and the job he did, here's something to chew on.  In their first round playoff series against Everett, the 8th seeded T-birds lost to the first seeded Silvertips in five games.   That's expected to happen.  Eight seeds just don't upset one seeds. In that series, the T-birds, with their one NHL free agent and one NHL drafted player (who missed the last two games of the series by the way) scored ten goals and allowed 22. 

Now, I'm not saying that is anything to write home about.  But by comparison, in the second round it was the Portland Winterhawks turn to face that same Everett team.  This was a Portland team that many experts believed would compete for a title this season.  That Portland team finished with the second best record in the Western Conference and fourth best regular season record in the entire WHL.  It was the very same Portland team with seven NHL draft picks on the roster, including four first rounders, along with a free agent goalie who also had signed an NHL deal. Like Seattle, Portland lost their second round series to the Silvertips in five games.  How many goals did they score?  Nine, one LESS then Seattle  How many did they give up?  21 just ONE fewer then the T-birds.

My point here is to draw attention to just how well Matt O'Dette did his first season behind the bench, when he could take a lesser roster then one loaded with NHL prospects, such as the one down in Portland, and essentially produce the same results.

It's just one season and there are no guarantees the second will be better then the first.  But I'm looking forward to watching O'Dette and his staff grow together with this young team.

The To Do List

Now that the season has ended and we've said goodbye to the players we know won't return next season, what's next for the Seattle Thunderbirds?  What are the priorities this offseason?  Will there be a battle for the three 20 year old spots or will that be settled before training camp? Is there going to be a goaltending controversy?  Inquiring minds want to know!

First up for the T-birds is the annual WHL Bantam Draft in early May.  Seattle has the 10th overall pick in the first round and two more picks in the middle of Round Two.  They have at least one pick in each remaining round.  Seattle Director of Personnel Cal Filson and his staff are busy finishing up their scouting and finalizing their draft board.  With a month to go, there is still a lot of scouting to do, with tournaments all over Western Canada and the U.S.  How does this pool of talent stack up against recent drafts?  Only time will tell but the T-birds are in good position to come away with some quality talent early in the selection process.  Filson told me earlier this week that there are some high end forwards at the top of the draft and there should be good depth among defenseman throughout draft day. 

Much of the work to be done between now and next fall is up to the players already on the organization's depth chart, especially the younger guys on the roster. Specifically there are a number of young guys who need to use this offseason to improve physically and get stronger.  In that regard it is an important offseason for players such as Sam Huo, Dillon Hamaliuk, Holden Katzalay, Owen Williams and Tyson Terretta to name a few.  They have shown flashes of their hockey talent and the potential is there but they need to get physically stronger to be more consistent over a long 72-game schedule.  The talent is there to make another playoff run in 2018-19.

As an example, and this is my own opinion, by March the physical exertion needed over a six month season seemed  to take it's toll on Hamaliuk.  That's not a surprise.  He was a 17 year old rookie playing mostly on the second line, often going up against older, more physically mature players.  Hamaliuk was an ironman, playing in all 72 games and he surprised many by finishing 6th in rookie scoring in the WHL with 54 points (15g, 39a).  A focused offseason and he could certainly bump those numbers up in year two, especially knowing it is his first year of eligibility for the NHL Draft.  He is one of those players on the roster who have length but now need to add muscle to his frame.  No one is asking these players to live in the gym the next five months but they need to pay heed to their offseason workout program provided to them by the team.  

One player who just got better and better as the season progressed and had a terrific five game postseason was rookie defenseman Jake Lee.  the 2016 first round bantam pick is a smart young man, both on and off the ice. He has a boatload of confidence to the point he's even a little cocky.  That's not necessarily a bad thing, in moderation.  The best players always have a little edge to their game and Lee certainly has that.  I'm not comparing the two talent-wise, but Mat Barzal had that characteristic as well.  Of course Barzal backed it up with his play on the ice.  Lee is just one season in and  is still in the proving-it process.  Lee did take on a bigger role after the trade of Aaron Hyman midseason and he took advantage and flourished.  Lee is the type of player you can build a core group around for the future.  Like Hamaliuk, Lee  too will be going into his first year of NHL draft eligibility so the 2018-19 campaign is an important one for him.  

One rookie who gets lost in the discussion is Tyler Carpendale.  Carpendale started the season rehabbing from an injury, then played in only 19 games before he suffered another injury that cost him the rest of the season.  Nineteen games is not a big sample size but I liked what I saw.  Carpendale was just getting going when his season was cut short.  He had scored all of his points (2g, 3a) in the six games prior to the injury.  This is a big power forward type who skates well and can punish players with his physical game. He was listed at 6'4" and was 197 lbs. when last season began.  I imagine he'll be bigger at the start of next season.  I think a healthy Carpendale would have affected games the second half of the year so I'm anxious to see him healthy again.  

What about the 20 year old situation?  Seattle has five players eligible for three spots.  Nolan Volcan is a lock, unless he signs a pro deal although even that doesn't preclude him from returning.  You can probably go ahead right now and sew the "C" on his jersey. He's the captain.  Volcan was the team's leading scorer (tied with the graduating Donovan Neuls) and second in goal production with a career best 32.  His trajectory says he could pot 40 next season.

Zack Andrusiak was tops on the team in goals scored with 36 and third in total scoring with 74 points, just two points back of Volcan and Neuls. He is the most "natural" goal scorer on the roster and like Volcan has the potential to be a 40 or even 50 goal scorer.  He'll be a critical element to the power play.  His 11 power play goals were second to the graduating Austin Strand's 14.  That type of offensive production is not easy to find so it is hard to imagine him not on the roster next season as a 20 year old.

That leaves one spot up for grabs among Noah Philp, Blake Barger and Mike Maclean.    Philp was the most consistent of the three mentioned and finished with 50 points.  Bargar is both a strong leader and a strong penalty killer whose season was interrupted by a late season injury.  Maclean was the feel good story, a 19 year old rookie who made the most of a half season in the WHL and is well liked by his teammates.  I'm guessing the third overage comes from the above trio. 

The one caveat?  All five of those candidates are forwards.  Seattle loses two of their best d-men in 20 year olds Strand and Turner Ottenbreit.  The most seasoned returning defenseman is 19 year old Jarret Tyszka, who enters his fourth campaign with the club.  Another 19 year old, Reece Harsch, will enter his third year.  After that it is all second year players and rookies.    Might Seattle look to add a veteran leader back on the blue line by acquiring a 20 year old defenseman to supplement that young group?  My initial thought is to say no and the team will let the young defensemen soak up the ice time.

It could also depend on how much confidence the brass has in the young forwards.  The T-birds have a bevy of wingers who are chomping at the bit, wanting more ice at the WHL level.  Besides those mentioned above, you have others such as Graeme Bryks, Payton Mount and Cody Savey. If they're going to be on the roster next season they're going to need ice time.  Could it come at the expense of a third 20 year old forward?  Seattle acquired two 19 year old forwards in Bargar and Philp early last season to help out with some veteran presence, then brought in MacLean in December.  All had a positive impact. They also added Jaxan Kaluski from Moose Jaw in a January trade and he'll enter his 19 year old year next fall.   They could do the same again this coming season and save that third overage spot for a defenseman if they feel they are too green on the blueline .  

Then there is the goaltending conundrum.  Seattle went through a tumultuous season in net because of injuries.  Three goalies who all got a minimum of 15 starts.  The biggest question mark is still the status of Carl Stankowski who missed the entire year.  Is he back next season and is he ready to go from day one?  Can the Thunderbirds rely on his health?  We know what he's capable of when healthy. He's an elite goalie at this level and has a championship ring to prove it.  Meanwhile,  Liam Hughes dealt with his own injuries the first half of the year but when healthy for the second half he showed he could handle the load and be a solid number one guy. There are probably a few teams still alive in the postseason, and a couple others who have been eliminated who, in hindsight, would have loved to have spent a 4th round bantam pick on Hughes as the T-birds did last September.  His second half numbers were among the best in the league.  

I guess the question is, can Seattle juggle the two and will those two be happy splitting time in net when both believe they are number one guys?  It's not like the franchise hasn't done that in the past. Go back to 2007-08 when Riku Helenius and Jacob DeSerres split goaltending duties and both finished with 20+ wins, sub 2.45 goals-against-averages and  both had save percentages north of .915.  At the time Helenius was a first round NHL Draft pick of the Tampa Bay Lightning.  The T-birds also have a capable number two goalie on the roster in Dorrin Luding and a couple of signed prospects in Cole Schwebius and Eric Ward.  

Unlike a year ago when Seattle lost nearly 400 points from the roster when the season was done, this time around the T-birds lose only between 200-230 points.  The T-birds potentially will have five of their top eight scorers back for next year in Volcan, Andrusiak, Matthew Wedman, Philp and Sami Moilanen.  Throw in Hamaliuk and of their top six point producing forwards, only Neuls won't be back next year.  Wedman's numbers were much better the second half, compared to his first half.  28 of his 47 points came after December, including 11 of his 17 goals.  Remember, this was a two and a half month stretch in which Seattle played primarily against the tough U.S. Division.  He was trending in the right direction. 

The same can be said of Philp, whose biggest contribution seemed to be his positive impact on the young forwards on the roster. He played often on a line that featured either Huo or Hamaliuk and often both.  Philp recorded 20 of his 50 points in the last 25 games of the season.  It's certainly not out of the realm of possibility that Philp is a point a game player next season if he's back as one of the team's three 20 year olds.  Philp is similar to the outgoing Neuls in that he can play on the wing or at center and can hold his own on both the power play and penalty kill. 

Meanwhile, hopefully Moilanen stays healthy next year.  He was on a 35 goal and 64 point pace before those injuries cost him 22 games, primarily in the second half.  There is no question he has 40 goal capability.  It's also no coincidence that when he was in the lineup Seattle scored at a higher per game rate. The T-birds offense was near four goals a game with him on the ice.  When he suffered the injury and missed February and part of March the goals per game average dipped to around two.  The dip in offense is not only because the team missed his scoring either.  His absence made the power play inconsistent.  His willingness to play a physical game and win puck battles creates turnovers that lead to scoring from other players.  

The two big point producers the team will have to replace are Neuls and Strand.  I think they replace that Neuls production with improvement from Hamaliuk who finished 10th on the team in points.   Hopefully a full season of Carpendale takes up some of that slack.  A healthy Moilanen and more consistent offensive production from Wedman will help.  If the third 20 year old is one of those forwards expect more points from that spot as well and a few other second year players should improve on their point totals. There is no reason to think Seattle can't do what they've done the past two years and score 250 goals or more.  

Strand and his 25 goals from the blue line will be harder to make up. Seattle does have a candidate on the roster in Jarret Tyszka.  Tyszka had an up and down season but still had 40 points (8g, 32a).  If the Montreal Canadiens prospects wants to earn a pro contract then he'll need to pick up his game next year and with no Strand or even an Ethan Bear on the roster anymore, he should get every chance to do that.  Obviously teams at the next level see he has talent or he wouldn't have been drafted by an NHL team.  He needs to have a good offseason and up his production in 2018-19.  He doesn't have to be Strand.  He doesn't have to be Bear.  He has to be the Jarret Tyszka Seattle used a first round bantam selection on in 2014.  We have seen glimpses of his high end game.  Now we need it for 72 games.  

Seattle surrendered far too many goals against.  That was a byproduct of a young roster, often times not as physically mature as the opponent.  The fluctuating situation in goal was also a contributing factor. But at times Seattle also got away from one of their core principles:  take care of the defensive zone first.  More attention to the d-zone, better puck management, a settled goaltending situation and another year in the system for the young players hopefully will cut down on the goals allowed.  

There are always unknown variables during the offseason that will affect next year's roster.  A surprise trade that brings a player in or sends a player out.  Maybe an unexpected signing of a list player or draft choice the team took a flyer on or a young player who took his offseason seriously and dramatically improves his game. I know you're all waiting for the second coming of Scott Eansor, right?   Until that happens though, these are the players Seattle has going into their offseason.  It's a solid group with loads of potential.  The question is, will they realize it?

A Good '97 Goes Well in a Cup

And that, as they say, is a wrap.  The book has closed on another season of Seattle Thunderbirds hockey.  This time, far too soon of course. The last two go-rounds, the T-birds stretched their season deep into May.  This time they could only make it to the last day of March.  Such is the nature of the beast.  The organization built up a championship roster over the course of four years and now they are in a reloading cycle.

How ironic is that Seattle's best period of hockey in the playoff series versus Everett might have been the turning point, only not in their favor.  After a road split to open up the best-of-seven the T-birds came home with home ice advantage in their back pocket.  They roared out of the gate in Game 3 and blitzed the Silvertips with 24 shots and an early power play goal.  They spent most of that period in the Everett end of the ice.  Yet when the period was over, despite how dominating they were, the game is tied 1-1.  Psychologically I think Seattle never recovered.  They should have had the lead going into the intermission.  they put Everett on their heels, yet it was not enough.  Seattle never got close to winning again.

Many pundits and prognosticators didn't believe in this team when the puck dropped on the season back in late September.  They didn't think they had the horses left after a Chynoweth Cup run to even make the postseason this spring. Many didn't think they could withstand the roster purge and a coaching staff makeover and still be competitive.  They were wrong.  The team competed every night.  They battled in the toughest division in the league and still came out with a winning record.  Every other team in the division was a buyer at some point this past season, adding veterans for a possible title run.  Seattle was a seller. They added pieces for the future, not the present.  They played without knowing who would be their number one goalie until January and still battled their way into the second season, as brief as it was.

How would they score after losing over 350 points from their championship roster?  They returned only one player who scored more then 20 goals the previous year.  That player, Sami Moilanen, potted 21 goals in 2016-17 and would be limited to just 22 goals this time around because he missed one-third of this year to injury. Yet the T-birds scored nearly as many goals this season (250) as they did last season (253).  Five 20 goal scorers emerged from the shadows and a majority of them should be back next year.

Among those who will not return is Austin Strand.  The 20 year old defenseman surprised many with his 25 goal performance this season.  His junior eligibility complete, he now heads to the pro ranks with a WHL championship ring on his finger. His year and a half in a Seattle jersey helped the undrafted d-man earn a free agent contract with the NHL's L.A. Kings.   Strand came to Seattle in a December 2016 trade with Red Deer, one of the final pieces needed for the T-birds run to the Cup last year. In two and a half seasons with the Rebels, Strand amassed all of seven goals.  In his season and a half with the T-birds he scored 33 then added five more in 25 playoff games.   Hashtag, change-of-scenery.

The end of the season over the weekend also just about closes the door on one of the best bantam drafts in recent Thunderbirds history.  The 2012 draft, the Mat Barzal draft, those '97 born players.  Donovan Neuls was the last player on the roster from a draft class that was used as the foundation for a championship.  Eight players from that group would make the roster at one point or another.  Only Logan Flodell remains in the league now, playing in goal for the Lethbridge Hurricanes who advanced to Round Two out East.  Four of those players are now playing professionally, two of them in the NHL. 

Meanwhile, Neuls went out with a career year, tying Nolan Volcan for the team lead in scoring with 76 points (22g, 54a).  Neuls though, was at his best when it mattered the most.  In 49 playoff games he registered 39 points (13g 26a). None of his 13 postseason goals were bigger then his overtime winner in Game One of last year's Championship Series against Regina.  When you hear the term "team player", you should think of Neuls.  He played every position on the ice in his T-birds career except for goalie.  And with the injuries the team suffered this season at that position,  who knows how close he may have come to going between the pipes. Center, wing, and yes even defenseman, he played it.  On the power play or penalty kill, tasked with shutting down an opposing team's top line, for four seasons Neuls was Seattle's Swiss Army Knife.  They should have used that to etch his name on the Chynoweth Cup.

We think of Turner Ottenbreit as a member of that Seattle draft class and in a way he was.  He too was drafted in the spring of 2012, albeit by the Saskatoon Blades.  He was the fourth to last player chosen, some 200-plus picks after the T-birds selected Barzal with the first overall pick.  Yet it is hard to imagine the T-birds winning as they did the last four seasons without number four patrolling the blue line.  His acquisition early in the 2014-15 season didn't set off any alarm bells. It was no blockbuster deal. Seattle had too many 20 year olds, Saskatoon had an open roster spot so the T-birds sent overage defenseman Adam Henry to the Blades and got the young Ottenbreit back in the deal.  333 games later, Otto leaves the organization an all-time fan favorite (any player who is despised by every other division rival is a fan favorite for life) but more importantly, he leaves a champion.

As my collegue Andy Eide over at mynorthwest.com pointed out to me, had that trade never been consummated, had Ottenbreit never left the Saskatoon organization, he would have not played one minute of playoff hockey in his WHL career. Saskatoon has missed out on the postseason for five straight years. Instead he comes to Seattle, plays in 49 playoff games, wins a division banner, two conference championships, a Chynoweth Cup, plays in the Memorial Cup and is captain his final season. Not bad for a 12th round bantam pick.  A textbook example to never give up on your dreams.

With the graduation of these three players and a few others who won't return next season, another layer is peeled away from that group that brought the franchise its greatest success.  We say goodbye to Donny, Strander and Otto the same way we said goodbye to Keegs, Barzy, Scotty, Gropper, Truzy and Bear last year and Smitty and Haufer, among others, the year before that.  They're gone but not forgotten.  No longer able to watch them up close day-to-day, we will follow their careers now from afar.  Once a T-bird, always a T-bird.