The calendar has turned from 2022 to 2023 but the season rolls along, and so do the Seattle Thunderbirds. The only thing that changes is the date. The goal is still the same, to be the last WHL team standing this spring. There is still plenty of season to go, another 35 games. So we are a long way from deciding things. As always, I caution you to buckle up, the second half is going to be an exciting ride.
The Thunderbirds ended 2022 on a hot streak, earning points in all 12 games in December. They were 30-seconds away from finishing the month 12-0-0-0 but had to "settle" for a mark of 11-0-0-1. Let's not forget they played ten of those 12 games without four of their best players and in four of those games they were minus their top three defensemen.
In doing so, they took over the top spot in the U.S. Division, the Western Conference and tied for the best record in the WHL. Is it tight at the top? Sure, but I'd rather be in that spot than the alternative.
With 146 goals in their first 33 games, Seattle is the top scoring team in the WHL, scoring even more goals then a few teams who have played more games. But team defense is this team's calling card and even without some of their top blueliners available recently they have allowed only 78 goals, the second fewest goals against in the league. Team defense means everyone protects the d-zone, but the best defense is also a good offense and spending more time in your opponents end of the ice.
The catch word for the Thunderbirds when the season began was "depth", as in this team should have a lot of players up and down the roster who can contribute. That has played out through the first 33 games. Seattle only has one players in the top ten in league scoring. That would be Jared Davidson who is ninth with 47-points. They only have two in the top twenty (Lucas Ciona is 12th). Yet they have potentially seven players who could finish with twenty or more goals. That's how you sit atop the WHL standings at the midpoint of the campaign.
And it is not just depth among their forwards. Seattle goes eight deep on the blue line. Among their defenseman, 16-year old Bryce Pickford is third in scoring behind only Kevin Korchinski and Jeremy Hanzel. All three rookie d-men, Pickford, Hyde Davidson and Ethan Mittelsteadt, scored a goal in the absence of Korchinski, Nolan Allan, and Luke Prokop (when he was out injured).
Reid Schaefer was Seattle's leading goal scorer when he left in early December to join Team Canada at the World Junior Championship. He is now fourth behind Davidson, Klye Crnkovic and Lucas Ciona. Ciona in particular has stepped up his game the last half of December with eight goals in the ten games since Shaefer departed. Another player who stepped it up? Nico Myatovic who potted six goals in his last 12-games. His ten goals on the season is already ten more than he had all of 2021-22.
Your number one goalie is unavailable for a month, what do you do? In the absence of #1a goaltender Thomas Milic, you turn to #1b, Scott Ratzlaff. All Ratlzlaff did in December was go 8-0-0-1 with a 1.65 GAA, a .941 SVPCT with two shutouts. He finished the month with back-to-back starts less than 24 hours apart and stopped 39 of the 40 shots he faced in the home-and-home against the Kelowna Rockets.
Good teams find ways to win and that was December in a nutshell. Even in their only setback, the shootout loss December 10th in Portland, they fought back from a two-goal defecit to take the lead before the infamous cough up of the puck behind the net led to a Portland goal with 30-seconds left. Remeber though, they played that game without their top three defensemen and number one goalie.
They won close games. Three of their games were decided by one goal. They won high scoring games, they won low scoring games and they won once in a blowout. They operative word in all of those sentences "won". They just kept winning. They'll try to keep doing that in January.
Seattle now hits the road for a trek through the Eastern Division of the Conference. Six games in nine days with a couple of marquee matchups in Winnipeg and Saskatoon near the end of the trip. At some point while they are out east, they'll see the return of the four players have been away with Team Canada. Halfway through the trip the WHL trade deadline will come and change the landscape of the league going forward.
Will the Thunderbirds and General Manager Bil Laforge make another deal? Will the NHL's Winnipeg Jets re-assign Brad Lambert to Seattle or send him back to the AHL's Manitoba Moose after World Juniors? What teams will be buyers and who will be the sellers? Can the T-Birds get more production out of that pesky power play? Ah, the intrigue!
My T-Birds Three Stars for the Post Christmas, end of December, four-games-in-five-nights, stretch:
Third Star: D Jeremy Hanzel. The more I watch him the more I appreciate his quiet, no nonsense, get the job done way of playing. He's been Seattle best defenseman the last month. he topped it off with the game winning goal New Year's Eve. His seven goals ties his career high set last season in 67 games. He had two goals and added two assists in the four games since returning from the Christmas break. At +36 he leads the WHL in the plus/minus category.
Second Star: G Scott Ratzlaff. A little rusty in the first game back when he had five pucks get past him up at Climate Pledge. That was more of a team effort though, as Seattle was less than sharp in the first game out of the break. He still got the win and bounced back by allowing just one goal in his next two starts. He still finished the three games he played with a 3-0-0-0 record, a 2.00 GAA and a .913 SVPCT with one shutout. He is now second in the league in both GAA (2.04) and SVCPT (.925) and his three shutouts lead the league.
First Star: W Lucas Ciona. The Calgary Flames prospect put up 11-points in the four games (5g, 6a). In those four games he potted two game winners, had the lone assist on the game winning goal New Year's Eve and finished at +7. He has risen to 1th in league scoring with 35 points (17g, 18) and is second in the WHL with a plus/minus of +33. In the ten games since the Big Four left for World Juniors he has put up 18 points (8g, 10a).
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