Mining for Gold Nuggets

With basically nothing at stake the final week of the season, Seattle goes 2-2. Most importlantly was the chance to rest up some players before the playoffs arrive and they got a chance to insert some young players into the lineup.

I certainly don't want to make more than there is of a a young prospect's debut in game 68 of a 68 game season, when there is nothing on the line for the team as he skates in the WHL for the first time.  It's a tremendously small sample size.  

But then I remember that the Thunderbirds, under the direction of General Manager Bil LaForge and Director of Player Personnel Cal Filson, have done such an amazing job of evaluating talent and finding quality players in the middle and late rounds of the draft. So I get a little more than intrigued when I see a player like Nishan Parmar come out and look like one of the regulars on this team, as he did Satruday night against Portland.

Parmar was Seattle's seventh round pick in the 2021 WHL Prospects Draft, taken 148th overall. He just signed his standard WHL Player Agreement a few weeks back. Certainly the Thunderbirds did their due diligence. They kept evaluating him over his last two seasons. They believe he has the makings of a Thunderbird.

Is he the next Reid Schaefer or Nico Myatovic, two recent players selected in the eighth and sixth rounds respectively of their WHL Prospects Drafts?  That's a lot of pressure to put on him. let's just let Nishan be Nishan.  But at the very least, I'm going to trust in the track record of the T-Birds scouts who have been more right than wrong over the last five to six years.

The scouts are the unsung heroes of the WHL.  Most do the work as a side job to their regular employment.  They do it because they love the game enough they're willing to put in thousands of miles or kilometers on their cars, traversing Western Canada and the U.S. hoping to unearth a gem who might one day hear his name called from the podium of an NHL Draft, or at the very least, hoist a Chynoweth Cup. They sacrifice their weekends. They drive through the frigid prairie winters, sometimes in blinding snow and darkness, often just to evaluate one player.

So as we close up the 2022-23 regular season and get ready for the playoffs, remember this team wasn't put together by happenstance.  Most of this roster was built through the hard work of that team of scouts. They are the unsung MVPs of this club.

Another young 'Bird made his debut Saturday night as well. Defenseman Kaleb Hartmann was chosen by Seattle in the second round of the 2022 draft, 37th overall.  There seemed to be no hesitation with him in shooting the puck and it appears he has a nice, heavy shot. He's already listed at 6'0", 170 lbs. He looks like he is going to be a solid presence for the next four of five years on the T-Birds back end.

So, if you are keeping score at home and wondering how the Thunderbirds will fill a roster after all the draft picks they traded this season, here's what we know is available the next few years:

2023-23 T-Birds rookie of the year Gracyn Sawchyn, a point per game player, soon to be drafted by an NHL team. Scott Ratzlaff, who at age 17 led the WHL in shutouts with five. He finished second in the WHL this season with a 2.18 goals against average and his .918 save percentage was second as well. Did I mention he won a gold medal with Canada last summer at the U18s? 

Defenseman Sawyer Mynio, another 17 year old who could hear his name called at the NHL Darft this summer as he has crept up onto the Central Scouting Draft rankings.  He played in all 68 games this season and finished at +50. And don't sleep on Coster Dunn.  Another of those mid-round draft picks (2020 7th round). He appears poised for a breakout. 

Can we talk about Seattle's 2021 draft class? The top three picks alone make this an excellent draft with Tij Iginla, Hyde Davidson and Bryce Pickford. When next fall's NHL Central Scouting's "One to Watch" list comes out, all three should see their names somewhere on those rankings.  But they're not the only players from that draft who will make an impact on the T-Birds future. 

Three others from that class have already made their Thunderbirds debuts.  Simon Lovsin, like Davidson and Pickford, was a second round pick. Goalie Spencer Michnik is 2-0 in the WHL and now we've seen a glimpse of Parmar.

Meanwhile the 2022 draft class says hold my root beer.  The T-Birds moved up five spots in that draft, sacrificing a third round pick, to get in position to select Braeden Cootes tenth overall in the first round.  I think they're pretty high on him. What we've seen of him in just seven games, seems to justify that move.We just saw the debut of Hartmann, one of two second round picks. They picked Kazden Mathies one spot after Hartmann.  Mathies just finished off a 47 point season playing in 40 games with the Warman Wildcats U18AAA squad, then added eight more points in eight playoff games.

The T-Birds have already signed three other players from that draft, fourth rounder Antonio Martorana, a forward, defenseman Caleb Potter, a fifth round pick, and ninth rounder Samuel Charko, another forward, You know who else was a ninth round selection in his draft year? Mekai Sanders. Again, we know Seattle's recent success with mid to late round picks, so if they're signing a ninth rounder this early, I'm going to trust they know what they're doing.

Let's also not lose sight of the fact that the T-Birds hold the rights to Lucas Sawchyn, Gracyn's younger brother. He was Seattle's first round pick in the 2022 U.S. Prospects Draft. He's not signed yet but let's hope Gracyn is a really good recruiter! Playing for Shattucks St. Mary's 16UAAA team Lucas put up 66 points in 50 games this season. You know who also put up 60 points when he played for Shattuck's 16UAAA team? Gracyn.

Is 2021 U.S. Prospects Draft first round pick Macklin Celebrini out of the picture now that he is playing in the USHL with the Chicago Steel and has made an NCAA verbal commitment? Probably. But you never close the door on a player considered to be the top pick for the 2024 NHL Draft. It's a longshot, but most probably said the same of all these mid round picks Seattle made recently, getting drafted into the NHL. How's that working out?

Finally, don't forget the Import Draft. Seattle will make two selections this summer. 

So when I see people lament the future, or some even reveling in the thought that the T-Birds are heading toward rock bottom in a few years, I chuckle. They just don't know that the strength of this team is not in their roster, but in those who are putting the roster together. Will they be Cup contenders? maybe not. But they're not falling off the side of a cliff either.  

One of the best feel good stories in my time with the Thunderbirds organization has to be Jared Davidson. From an undrafted, camp invite at age 16 to a team MVP at age 20 after leading the team in scoring for a second straight season. Along the way he did enough to get drafted by the NHL's Montreal Canadians. 

He was invited to camp five years ago because he just happened to play on the same U16 team as the son of the T-birds goalie coach at the time. I remember talking to GM LaForge that fall when Davidson made the team. He said, just you watch, he's gonna be a good player in this league, especially by the time he's 20.  Except for not getting that 100th career WHL goal, it's been a great five years as a T-Bird and just another reason to trust this team's talent evaluators. they know what they're doing.

My Three Stars for the T-Birds just completed regular season:

Third Star: This might surpise you but I'm going with Scott Ratzlaff.  When Seattle lost Thomas Milic for a month to Team Canada for World Juniors I'm betting a lot of folks were saying, hey, just get through the month at .500 and we'll be satisfied.  Instead, the T-Birds went 11-0-0-1 in twelve games. They kept pace with the teams at the top of the standings. Ratzlaff started ten of them and went 9-0-0-1. Sure, he got help from the team around him but he carried the workload in net and proved he could handle it.  He led the league this season with five shutouts and was second in GAA and SVPCT. Because Milic was away Ratzlaff actually ended up with more starts and minutes played.  

Second Star: D Jeremy Hanzel.  Similar to Ratzaff. Seattle lost two top defensemen to Team Canada for a month because of World Juniors. No Kevin Korchinski, no Nolan Allan, no problem.  Again it was a team effort and Luke Prokop and Sawyer Mynio were just as solid on the back end but Hanzel was Seattle's most consistent defenseman all season.  He finished with career bests in goals and points. He absolutley obliterated the franchise record for plus/minus at +70 (the old record was +50). A lot of hockey people aren't the biggest believes in the plus/minus stat but it says to me more good things were happening on the ice for Seattle when Hanzel was out there.

First Star: C Jared Davidson. On a team that is filled with first round NHL draft picks, it was Davidson who led the team in points and goals.  Yes, he ended up one goal shy of 100 for his WHL career, but remember, he lost the end of the 2019-2020 season and all but 23 games in 2020-21 to the Covid pandemic.  No question had he had a full five year WHL career, he would not only have reached 100 goals but certainly zipped past it.  To go from camp invite to a two-time leading point producer on two of the best teams in franchise history is a remarkable accomplishment for the Montreal Canadians prospect.  

Making History While Making a Run

The Thunderbirds ultimate goal this season, like all seasons, is always the same. It's the same goal shared by 21 other WHL teams every September.  They want to be the last team standing. They want to be the team hoisting the Chynoweth Cup. Like the other teams in the league, they want to earn that shot at the Memorial Cup.

If, along the way, they make a little history, well that's just a little icing on the cake but it's not the pinnacle of their season.  Still, a few new records for the history book looks nice on the old resume'.  This season, the team is writing a few new chapters in the good book Thunderbirds.

With their two wins over Portland this past weekend, Seattle has now gone 17 consecutive games with a point earned (16-0-0-1). That beats the old mark set in the 1994-95 season by two games.  The win down at the Veterans Memorial Coliseum Saturday was the team's 24th on the road this season. That too is a new club record, breaking the old mark that was set just last season.

Next up is a chance to eclipse the 52-win season set back in 1989-90 when the team finished 52-17-3. The T-birds tied the record Saturday and enter play this week at 52-9-1-2. What's remarkable about this year's team equalling the 1989-90 team in wins is how they accomplished it.  In the 1989-90 season they were playing a 72-game schedule and earned their 52nd win in game #71. This year's team, playing just a 68-game season, earned win #52 in game 64. 

Ironically, in both cases, the 52nd win came at the expense of the rival Winterhawks and in both instances the date of win #52 was March 18th.  In the 89-90 season win 52 wa a 13-2 shellacking of Portland at home, while this time around it was 4-2 win in the Rose City. The 1989-90 team had one more chance to add to their win total that season, but lost the final game of the regular season, to Portland, 6-5.  This time around the T-Birds have four chances to get win #53.

Seattle cannot set a new record for home ice wins.  After viewing a page on the team website for team records, I found, with the help of James Prekeges, a glitch. It recorded the 29 wins in the 2015-16 season as the high water mark. But upon further research, the record is actually 33, set by that 1989-90 team that finished 33-2-1 at home.  The closest this team can come to that is 30 wins, should they win their final two home games.  

More importantly right now though, is sewing up the top seed for the Western Conference playoffs.  The magic number after the weekend is one point.  A win Tuesday over Kamloops will seal the deal.  There is some poetry to that if it happens. Seattle would clinch the top seed by beating the only team that could catch them.

As for individual records, Jared Davidson still needs one goal to reach 100 as a Thunderbird. he would become the 12th player in franchise history to do it. The last to do it was Nolan Volcan who finished with exactly 100-goals over his five seasons and 321 games with the club (2013-2018). Becausse of Covid, Davidson is trying to accomplish it in 255 games or less. By comparison, Ryan Gropp scored 117 goals in 258 games.

With two more goals Davidson would join the 40-40 club. That's consecutive seasons with 40-goals scored.  Davidson finished last season with 42. he currently sits at 38.  The last time it was accomplished was the 1993-94/1994-95 seasons when Chris Herperger put up seasons of 44 and 49 goals.  

There are only two other members of the 40-40 club, Victor Gervais and some guy named Glen Goodall. Goodall not only is the inaugural member of the 40-40 club, he's the only member of the 50-50 club.  Well, actually the 50-50-50 club as he surpassed the 50-goal mark three consecutive seasons. Remember though, Davidson is doing it in 68-game seasons, while the other three accomplished it in 72-game seasons.

There is an outside chance the T-Birds could finish the season with five 30-goal scorers. Right now they have two, Davidson and Kyle Crnkovic.  After his shorthanded goal Saturday, Nico Myatovic sits at 28. Lucas Ciona has 27 and Reid Schaefer has 26. So, there is work to do to match that 1989-90 team that finished with five 30-goal scorers (Goodall, Gervais, Nedved, Vallis and Kasowski).

The last time Seattle finished with three 30-goal scorers was still 20-years ago when Brooks Laich, Dustin Johner and Greg Black did it in the 2002-03 season.

Niether current Seattle goalie will come close to the season Bryan Bridges had in net for the Thunderbirds back in 2004-05. In 58 games that season Bridges went 36-18-2-2, finished with a franchise record 1.83 goals against average, with a save percentage of .926.  Bridges still holds the WHL record for career shutouts with 21 and 13 of them came during the 04-05 campaign.  

Thomas Milic is on pace to end the year with the second best GAA average in team history. He could still set the club record for best save percentage in a single season though.  Right now he sits at .928 which would tie him with Taran Kozun who finished with a .928 SVPCT in 2013-14. I would imagine Milic is getting at least two more starts in the team's final four regular season games.  

Again, all these records this team is piling up are nice accomplishments but in the end their is only one that counts and that's winning a championship.

My T-Birds three stars for the weekend sweep of Portland:

Third Star: G Thomas Milic. His second period down in Portland was a difference maker. he stopped a breakaway that would have tied the game at 1-1. Another spectacular two-save sequence started the rush up ice that led to the T-Birds second goal. Twelve shots faced, twelve saves made in the period, as Portland was awarded three power plays. He has now allowed just 12 goals in his last ten starts. He's 11-0-0-1 in his last twelve starts.

Second Star: W Dylan Guenther. Historic weekend for the Arizona Coyotes top prospect as he reached 200 points in his WHL career with a three point game (1g, 2a) Friday, then added a diving goal Saturday.  He needs five goals in the final four games to hit the 100 goal mark for his WHL career.

First Star: C Brad Lambert.  His speed, stick handling and skating ability are becoming a driving force for the Thunderbirds offense.  earning a point or two each night is becoming the norm for the Winnipeg Jets 2022 first round pick.  A three points weekend with a goal and two assists, Lambert has a point in all but two games since joining the T-birds and eight points (3g, 5a) in his last four games.

Nifty at Fifty

For just the second time in the 46-seasons they've been playing in the Seattle area, the Thunderbirds have won fifty games in a season. Win number fifty came Saturday in a 5-1 victory over Everett and in the midst of a stretch where the team has gone 15-0-0-1.  That in itself is a franchise record. The most consecutive games with a point earned. The previous record was set in the 1994-95 season.

And, hopefuly, they're not done creating new franchise benchmarks. With six regular season games remaining, the T-birds need just three wins to surpass the 52-games won by the 1989-90 team.  Remember too, back in '89-90, they played 72-games.  This year's team is attempting to eclipse that 52-win record in just 68 games.

Another potential record to set? Home wins.  Seattle won 29 home games in 2015-16. they currently have 27 with three home games remaining.  

And with their win Saturday over the Silvertips, the Thunderbirds have also guaranteed they will finish with the fewest losses in regulation.  During the 1989-90 campaign they lost just 17 games in regulation, finishing 52-17-3 (they still had ties back then). Currently the T-birds have just nine regulation losses (50-9-1-2). With six games remaining the most regulation losses this year's team could suffer, if they were to lose their final six games, would be fifteen.

Of course I can tell you there is only one achievement this team really cares about. Those franchise records are nice, but they would probaly tell you they mean nothing if they don't win a championship. That's where their focus is and where it will be until the final horn sounds on this season.

Does anyone have a more difficult schedule remaining then the Thunderbirds? They will play just two teams, Portland and Kamloops, over the final six games and combined the record of those two clubs is 82-28-8-5. Now, you could argue Portland is not playing at the level they were back in January (4-10-2-1 since the start of February), but they are still a rival and still have the third best record in the Western Conference.

The T-birds played a lot of hockey the last couple of weeks, playing six games in nine days. They went 5-0-0-1 and were one overtime interference penalty away from sweeping all six.  And to be honest I don't think they played to their optimal best in any of the games.  Let's hope they use the final six games to put a full sixty minute effort together.  It's great they can flip the switch and go turbo in the third period, just not sure you want to be doing that in the playoffs.

Of course Seattle isn't playing with a full deck, missing four players to various injuries.  It is what most teams are going through as you get down to the final half dozen games of a grueling 68-game schedule. Fortunately the T-Birds have the depth to overcome those missing components. 

One player stepping forward is Coster Dunn.  He has been quite noticeable on the ice the last couple of weeks. We are starting to see his complete game develop. He's winning faceoffs, winning puck battles and chipping in with a few points along the way. Dare I say he is starting to remind me of last season's version of Nico Myatovic?  

I also think for Dunn it is a bit of a Catch-22 situation. Being on such a deep team lets him develop on the fourth line while those top nine forwards do the heavy lifting. But being on such a deep team means he might not be getting the minutes that would get him more notice. I think he's got enough skill in him that on a lesser team he could be a consistent second line player.  He was listed at 6'0" to start the season. He looks like he might be an inch or two taller now. Either way I think he has the frame to add more muscle.  That would be the next step in his evolution.  I'm not saying he'll go from four goals to 27 goals next season, as Myatovic did this year, but I could see him taking a big leap in 2023-24.  

Seattle spent a lot of draft capital to build this roster.  They'll be lacking quite a few draft picks for a couple of seasons. That puts the onus on the scouts to unearth some late round gems or discover those undrafted players who fit what the T-birds do.  The club's track record in that regard recently is pretty good.  They found players like Matt Rempe and Jared Davidson outside the WHL Prospects Draft.  Neither was drafted into the WHL but both were drafted into the NHL.  Davidson is on the verge of his second 40-goal season and the past two years he's led one of the top teams in the league in scoring. 

Reid Schaefer was an eighth round draft pick who turned into a first round NHL selection. Myatovic was taken in the sixth round. He too is most likely to get chosen in the next NHL draft this summer.  Dunn was selected by Seattle in round seven. Mekai Sanders was a ninth rounder. Sam Popowich came to the T-Birds out of round five. Yes, you still have to hit on your top picks, but championship teams get built on the strength of depth players found in later rounds, free agency and through smart trades. 

The Thunderbirds finish the regular season playing their final six games over a span of nine days; three at home, three away. Half a dozen games left and then the playoffs begin!

My Three T-Birds Stars for this five-games-in-nine-days stretch:

Third Star: G Thomas Milic and G Scott Ratzlaff.  Goaltending is the backbone of a team.  Sometimes it can be more difficult in the crease when you are facing fewer shots than the opponent.  It can make it harder to stay focused. That has not been a problem for this dynamic duo.  Milic is now number one in the league in both GAA and save percentage. Ratzlaff is right behind at number two.  Together they have combined for a league leading nine shutouts.

Second Star: C Jared Davidson. Six goals and an assist in the five games.  He now sits one shy of 100 goals as a Thunderbird, something only eleven other players in franchise history have accomplished. A training camp invitee who made the team as a 16-year old, he is two goals away from his second consecutive 40-goal season. On the cusp of leading the team in point production for a second straight season.  

First Star: C Brad Lambert. Sent down to Seattle by the NHL's Winnipeg Jets after spending the first half of the season with the Jets AHL affiliate, he has embraced the opportunity. In just 21 games with the Thunderbirds he has 32-points (14g, 18a). Three of his goals are game winners.  His 1.52 points per game average is best on the team. In the five games just played he earned eight points (2g, 6a). Had a highlight reel type goal Friday against Tri-City but did himself one better with a highlight reel assist Saturday against Everett.