In a scheduling and happenstance quirk, the Victoria Royals have swept the Tri-City Americans two seasons running heading into the Christmas Break. But that’s the only similarity between the two situations. Last season, the Royals went into the break at 7-23-3 and 10 points adrift a playoff position and it only got worse in the new year. This season they are going into the break at 20-12-2 and are 16 points to the good of a post-season berth as the most improved team in the Western Hockey League.
The rising Royals, who have already surpassed by three games their entire win total of 17 from past season, have won six of their last seven games and 20 of their last 30 after beginning the season 0-4.
The rebound began under former head coach Dan Price and has continued under new bench-boss James Patrick following an awkward and strangely-timed coaching change when the Royals were 8-7-1.
“We just want to build off of this. I feel that our confidence has grown,” said Patrick, in the media scrum following the second of two victories over the Americans on the weekend.
“There has been a lot of growth. It’s going to take the same kind of effort in the second half to keep this going.”
And the ‘P’ word is actually being mentioned after three years of post-season darkness on Blanshard Street.
“A big part of our group haven’t seen playoff action. Our goal is to get there and do something special,” said Patrick, who last season led the regular-season champion Winnipeg Ice to the WHL playoff final against the Seattle Thunderbirds.
“We know every game, every two points, is so vital. The games now all count at the end. I can’t say enough about our players’ resiliency, the no quit. It’s shown in our come-from-behind victories. We’ve bought in.”
The Royals were poised to pop this season after missing the playoffs the past two seasons and finishing dead last in the league in the bubble season before that. But only modestly as this group had done so much losing, the ceiling was considered low even as they became older. Most pundits had them fighting for the seventh or eighth playoff berths this season. Nobody had them pegged tied for fourth in the Western Conference, where they are at the break.
It is an amalgam of the team Price put together bolstered with some astute moves from the new management group led by GM Joey Poljanowski and assistant GM Jake Heisinger. They quickly moved to put their own stamp on the team by jettisoning Canada U-18 players and Price-era veterans Brayden Schuurman and Kalem Parker, the latter an NHL draft pick of the Minnesota Wild, Teague Patton and Carter Dereniwsky while adding the likes of Dawson Pasternak and Ben Riche in trade moves that paid immediate dividends.
The combination of eras is most evident in the Royals’ productive second line which features rookie centre Cole Reschny, selected by then-GM Price third overall in the first round of the 2022 WHL prospects draft, between Poljanowski-Heisinger acquisitions Pasternak and Riche.
“You can look at Cole Reschny [ranked for the second round of the 2025 NHL draft] as a very high end prospect. The chemistry between him and Dawson Pasternak and Ben Riche has created is a real formidable line for us,” said Patrick.
The past two wins, a sweep of the Americans, were without Robin Sapousek and Casper Haugen Evensen, who are in Sweden for the 2024 world junior championship tournament with Czechia and Norway, respectively.
Sapousek is third in Royals points with 32 behind Tanner Scott’s 35 and Pasternak’s 34 with Reschny and holdover defenceman Nate Misskey also in the top-five with 28 points each. Scott, Pasternak and Sapousek lead the team with 13 goals each with Rescnhy on 12 and Riche 11.
Veteran Matthew Hodson has replaced Sapousek at centre between Scott and Reggie Newman on Victoria’s top line until after the world juniors. All four are Price-era throwbacks.
“Last year I was part of a team that didn’t finish too high in the standings and year before that, too. All the guys who are left here through that, like me, have been thinking about turning it around and making the playoffs,” said Scott.
“There’s a sense of maturity from the older guys who have been here for awhile and established a hard-working mentality. This season we have come out strong and want to keep it going.”
The Royals will return to play after the break on Dec. 27 against the Vancouver Giants at the Langley Events Centre and on Dec. 28 against the Wild in Wenatchee, Washington, before returning to Save-on-Foods Memorial Centre to meet the Edmonton Oil Kings on Dec. 30 and Calgary Hitmen on Jan. 1.
ICE CHIPS: The WHL is represented by eight players on the Canadian team at the IIHF 2024 world junior championship tournament beginning Boxing Day in Gothenburg, Sweden.
