Asked what drives his team, after the breakout success of last season, Victoria Royals head coach Dave Lowry dryly answers: “We didn’t win our last game.”
After the 48 victories and 100 points in the 2013-14 Western Hockey League season, which didn’t just break the previous franchise records but obliterated them, the Royals are looking for even more this season. The team won its first playoff series last season in eight years of the franchise’s existence — the first five in Chilliwack as the Bruins — but this outfit knows that ultimate success is measured in championships.
That, of course, that will be easier said than done. This is no longer an unassuming team hidden away on an Island that is as far west as you can go in Canada. The Royals made an impression last season with the fifth best record in the WHL and you know what they say about tall poppies:There is always somebody out there with a weed-whacker looking to cut you down to size.
“The way we are perceived by other teams has changed. We’re not an underdog anymore,” says Royals general-manager Cam Hope.
“Now, other teams look at us as a challenge. We’re not sneaking up on anybody anymore. And that’s a change for this franchise.”
And a rather profound one.
This is a franchise that previously put the mushy in middle.
In five years as the Chilliwack Bruins, the franchise had only one winning season and never won a playoff series. Its NHL draft and pro alumni list was light and included non-luminaries such as Oscar Moller, Nick Holden, Roman Horak, Mark Santorelli, Brandon Manning and Ryan Howse — hardly household names outside a small circle of Bruins fandom. That tepid pattern continued when the franchise was relocated to Victoria and renamed the Royals in 2011-12. The first year on Blanshard Street resulted in a lacklustre 24-41-7 regular-season record and hasty 4-0 exit in the playoffs.
Then came Hope and change.
The club’s fortunes began to alter when Hope was hired as general manager in the summer of 2012, and he in turn hired former NHLer Lowry to become the new head coach of the Royals. The pair made an immediate impact with franchise highs in 2012-13 in both wins (35) and points (77). They followed up by smashing both those standards last season and claiming a first playoff series victory in franchise history for good measure.
“There was a good foundation … a lot of the pieces were in place,” said Hope, who came to the Royals after an administrative run with the New York Rangers, including as assistant general manager.
How Lowry and Hope managed last season’s transformation should be required study for any would-be coaches or general managers. With a roster not exactly loaded with Portland Winterhawks-style star power, the Royals squeezed the most out of what they had.
Hope and Lowry were justifiably rewarded for their work by being named the WHL executive of the year and coach of the year, respectively, for 2013-14. The Royals’ turnaround didn’t go unnoticed by Hockey Canada, which has named Lowry an assistant coach for the host Canadian national side in the 2015 world junior championships to be held in late December and early January in Montreal and Toronto.
“The coaching business is a hazy mystery to guys like me, but Dave [Lowry] and Enio [Royals assistant coach Enio Sacilotto] have an ability to connect to the players and get them to believe in what they are saying and trying to accomplish.”
In many ways, the spine of this Victoria team is the unsung players such as forwards Logan Fisher, Taylor Crunk, Brandon Fushimi and defenceman Ryan Gagnon. It’s not necessarily the six Royals who are currently skating in NHL rookie camps — Joe Hicketts with the Detroit Red Wings, fellow-blue-liner Travis Brown with the Ottawa Senators, forward Axel Blomqvist with the Winnipeg Jets and defenceman Keegan Kanzig and forwards Austin Carroll and Brandon Magee with the Calgary Flames. (Not that these players won’t be critical to the success of the Royals this season).
For this style to work, the more skilful players have to sublimate some of their flashier impulses for the common weal.
Forward Tyler Soy is emerging as a scoring star for Victoria. But he knows what wins games within this structure.
“Sometimes it’s hard [for skill players not to take a few chances and freelance]. But in the long run, if we stick to the same page, it is going to be worth it,” said Soy.
“We have to be a hard-working team every night and stay within the system. That’s our best chance for success.”
And you can’t argue with the results the past two seasons, especially last year.
Not that it’s all robotics, defence and systems.
“Dave [Lowry] allows you some freedom to be creative,” said Soy.
Ironically, that may be more the style of the future for the Royals. The last two bantam drafts have brought a flurry of small, speedy, skilful forwards into the Royals fold — undersized but darting and dizzying 16- to 17-year-olds such as Dante Hannoun, Matthew Phillips, Jared Dmytriw, Regan Nagy and Matthew Campese, who will definitely be leaving a stylistic stamp on the team over the next four to five seasons.
“It seems there will be more smaller guys in the years ahead on this team, but the team will be quicker,” said the five-foot-six Hannoun, taken by Victoria in the first round of the 2013 bantam draft.
“But we will continue battling in the corners.”
Spoken like a true Royal.
Junior hockey rosters are an evolving process, noted Hope.
“It’s the nature of the business that you can only keep these players together for a short period of time,” said the Royals general-manager.
And the complexion of the group changes with each incoming class. So a bit of uncertainty and hesitation is inherent within the process.
“If you draft well, prepare well and create a system, you should be able to reduce that uncertainty,” said Hope.
The Royals open the 2014-15 WHL regular season with road games Friday in Kamloops against the Blazers and Saturday in Vancouver against the Giants.
Victoria opens at home with a two-game set Sept. 26-27 at Save-on-Foods Memorial Centre against the Blazers.