Nothing better illustrates the boom-and-bust cycle of major-junior hockey than the fact the Victoria Royals feel comfortable in giving 16-year-old goaltender Brock Gould his first career WHL start tonight against the defending league champions.
That’s because this season’s Swift Current Broncos aren’t last season’s Broncos. Far from it. The franchise that won its first WHL championship in 25 years last spring graduated most of its impact players and is 1-8 to start this season as it begins that slow, always painful, rebuild process such teams go through after the championship high of the season before.
The Broncos loaded up last season, trading away a part of their future to stock up on veteran players for the championship run, and now comes the time to pay the price. And pay they will over the next few seasons as 14 players, the head coach, two assistant coaches and the director of hockey operations have left from last spring’s Swift Current championship squad.
Not that this makes the butterflies disappear any quicker for Gould, who makes his WHL debut tonight after 20-year-old veteran Griffen Outhouse has played in the previous eight games for the Royals (7-1).
“There are quite a few of them [butterflies],” admitted Gould.
But he knows those will disappear once the first puck is shot his way.
“I’m excited. This is what you work for and I can’t wait to get out there,” said Gould.
“This is what I’ve been working for all summer, and it has led to this moment. I’ve been watching Griff [Outhouse] because I can learn so much from him.”
The Royals handed their future in the crease to Gould, who hails from Colorado Springs and turns 17 in December, when they traded incumbent backup Dean McNabb to the Regina Pats last month. The rookie Gould is moving up from Midget but has ample height at six-foot-four.
“My size helps but I also rely on my athleticism,” said Gould.
The Broncos, meanwhile, lost their first seven games while Victoria won its first seven. The reverse symmetry continued as the Royals lost their first game, a 3-2 decision Sunday against the Vancouver Giants, while Swift Current won its first game with a 3-2 overtime victory Saturday against Brandon as Broncos goaltender Joel Hofer made 53 saves. He made another 65 in a 6-2 loss to the Giants in Langley on Tuesday night in what looks to be a season of heavy puck bombardment.
“We feel Swift Current is underrated and this is a big game for us,” said Royals head coach Dan Price.
Yet, the Broncos are not enough to warrant the Outhouse treatment.
“Griffen needed, and deserved, a rest, and we have Kelowna coming in on Friday and Saturday,” said Price.
“Brock has improved every day [in practice].”
Victoria’s players will have Gould’s back covered tonight, not that they say he needs it any more than Outhouse.
“Brock works so hard and we have trust in him,” said Royals forward Kaid Oliver.
Meanwhile, Royals GM Cameron Hope was asked about Swift Current’s dramatic turnabout in fortunes. Hope’s Royals have taken a different approach to team building. They have not yet had that champagne high of a league playoff title, having never made it past the second round of the playoffs, yet only the Kelowna Rockets have won more regular-season games than the Royals over the past five years in the WHL. Victoria is also one of only four of the 22 WHL teams to have made the playoffs each season of the seven-year span the Royals have been in the league and appear headed for the playoffs for an eighth consecutive season under the Royals banner.
Boom and bust? No thanks, says Hope. Steady as it goes is the mantra for this organization, which was ranked No. 4 in last week’s Canadian Hockey League national top-10 poll.
“We are always mindful of our assets pool,” said Hope.
“Even when we go all-in, like last season, we do so within a framework of keeping a core that you can still build around the following season.”
ICE CHIPS: Forward Payton Mount of the Seattle Thunderbirds and goaltender Dylan Garand of the Kamloops Blazers, both Victoria-raised products, were among 19 WHL players named among the 66 for Canada Black, Canada Red and Canada White for the 2018 World U-17 Hockey Challenge from Nov. 3-10 in New Brunswick. The Canadian teams will face the U-17 national teams of the U.S., Czech Republic, Finland, Russia and Sweden.
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