THAT WAS GR8

 Cliches you often hear about winning: 

1.Defense wins championships.  

2.The best defense is a good offense.

They seem like contradictory statements but they both can be true at the same time, especially in the game of hockey. Seattle's first two games of the season are exhibit A.  

Opening night on the road, the T-Birds are in a scoreless battle. To give themselves a chance to win, they have to keep the puck out of their net until they can find some offense. It starts with stellar play from their goalie, Grayson Malinoski. He is literally the last line of defense.  But it's also five guys in front of him clearing rebounds, blocking shots and getting pucks up ice, free of the defensive zone. It's killing off penalties. Team defense. Eventually they win 1-0 in overtime.

Saturday at home it's an eight goal explosion. It's putting pressure on the opposing team's goal with a strong forecheck. It's going hard to the net and getting greasy goals. It's forcing turnover inside the opponent's blue line. It's cycling the puck below the opponent's goal line. It's having the puck on your stick more than the opposition has it on their sticks. It's rolling four lines and three defensive pairs in a seamless fashion. Team offense. 

If you combine the two, you're going to win more games than you lose, thus Seattle is off to a 2-0 start. It has helped that the T-Birds get a soft start to the season. One game opening weekend, one game this weekend and just one game next weekend,  Eventually though, the schedule will ramp up.  We'll see how they respond to playing back-to-back nights and three games in five days as they will when October rolls around. But winning, like playing an instrument or learning to drive a car, is a learned habit. The more you do it, the better you get at it.  early on the T-Birds are learning the valuable lessons of what it takes to win.

Talking to head coach Matt O'Dette and to some of the players after Saturday's home opening win, there was a common theme. They all said some variation of the same thing; every player contributed to the win whether their name was on the scoresheet or not. A compete twenty player effort. No one was taking all the credit. The players were as eager to praise the teammate who didn't score a goal or get an assist, as they were the player with a multiple point night. It's an acknowledgement that you win as a team and you lose as a team. All for one and one for all.

There have been some very good goalies to come through the organization over the fifty years of the franchise's existence.  But Saturday night Grayson Malinoski put his name in the team record book by doing something that hadn't been done before, two consecutive shutouts to open the season. Sixty-three saves and a pair of Ws for the Saskatoon native. At the end of Game Five of last spring's first round playoff loss to Penticton, I saw someone pick up a copy of the T-Birds team roster, study it, then say Seattle may have one of the best goaltending tandems returning for the 2026-27 season. That tandem is off to a good start and we haven't even seen Marek Sklenicka, the NHL draft pick, play a game yet.

An eight goal explosion in game two, a 2-0 record and the team's most potent offensive weapon, Brock England, has yet to light the lamp. One assist through two games for the team's leading returning scorer from a season ago. Just wait 'til he gets the goal scoring going. And he will. Just the threat of his offensive prowess has opponents looking sideways when he's out there. He led the team with six shots Saturday so he's gonna get dialed in.

One gray cloud through the first two games. Defenseman Tai Riley, hurt in training camp (upper body injury) wasn't able to heal up so he's had a procedure that will keep him out a couple of months. Get well soon Tai!

My Three Stars for the first two games of the season:

Thrid Star. D Grayson Tash.  Headsy pass to set up the overtime winner in Wenatchee last weekend. A goal and an assist and a +3 in the home opener. Seattle added a lot of high end talent to their back end n the offseason including a couple of NHL draft picks. Those guys played well in their WHL debuts Satruday, but it was the returning d-man Tash who stepped up his game.

Second Star. C Sawyer Mayes.  Mayes had a terrific training camp and preseason. He attended rookie camp with the NHL's Buffalo Sabres.  He's playing with a lot of confidence right now. Solid in the face off circle as usual opening night on the road then followed that up with a four assist, +5 performance in the 8-0 win Saturday at home.

First Star. G Grayson Malinoski. Opened the season with a 31-save shutout on the road and earned WHL Goalie of the Week honors. Followed that with a 32-save shutout performance in the home opener. He finished last season with a strong second half and is building off that through his first two starts this season. Dare we say WHL Goalie of the Month?