Photo credit - Vincent Ethier
Things that make me go hmm
May 18, 2024 | 11:00 PM
- It has been a long wait. The Moose Jaw Warriors are WHL champions. Relocating from Winnipeg for the start of the 1984-85 season, the city that takes so much pride in its junior hockey team is in the winner’s circle. To think it only took 44 wins during the regular season, before getting laser-focused in 20 playoff games. The last team with that low of a win total, yet earned a WHL title was the 46-win Seattle Thunderbirds in 2017. The Warriors were 16-4 in the postseason.
- The 2024 Memorial Cup will be held in Saginaw, Michigan. It marks only the fourth time the tournament has been held in the U.S. with previous stops in Portland, Seattle, and Spokane. Organizers believe this year’s tournament will generate close to 24 million dollars for the local economy. An estimated 45 hundred overnight hotel stays are expected over the 13 days (about 2 weeks) of the tournament. The event begins Wednesday.
- From a Kelowna perspective, several connections exist. Among them is former Kelowna Rockets forward Rilen Kovasevic, who calls Kelowna home, lifting the Ed Chynoweth Cup over his head. Now 19, Kovasevic was a 10th-round bantam pick of the Rockets in 2019, before being traded to the Edmonton Oil Kings for 20-year-old Carsen Golder and a third-round WHL Prospect Pick. This season the Oil Kings dealt him to Moose Jaw. Kovasevic had a solid playoff series with 4+11=15 in 20 playoff games.
- While he didn’t dress for any playoff action, 17-year-old Kelowna born and raised Max Finley, a first-year member of the Warriors, will be taking in the sights and sounds of the 2024 Memorial Cup. A second-round prospect pick of the Warriors from 2021, Finley’s father Jeff will also be there. Jeff Finley is an NHL scout with the Winnipeg Jets.
- West Kelowna is well represented at the Memorial Cup too. Lyden Lakovic scored 18 goals with the Warriors this season. The 17-year-old was a second-round pick of Moose Jaw in 2021. Scoring two big goals in the Eastern Conference finals against Saskatoon, Lakovic’s younger brother, Von, was just drafted by the Kelowna Rockets in the 6th round of the 2024 WHL Prospects Draft.
- The last time the Kelowna Rockets won the WHL title – back in 2015 – the team earned 53 victories during the regular season. The 2009 championship team had 47 victories, while the 2005 team that won it all had just 45 wins over 72 games. The 2003 league champions, the first title in Kelowna Rockets franchise history, won 51 times.
- I reached out to Moose Jaw Warriors broadcaster James Gallo after the championship victory congratulating him on being in the winner’s circle. I especially like it when long time broadcasters in our great league have a chance to call championship hockey. I’ve been there, I’ve done that, and it is one of the highest rewards for doing what we do. While we as broadcasters have zero influence on what happens on the ice, we too feel the losses heavily and get high on the team’s successes. As I’ve always said, when I don’t care how my team does, and losses are accepted as easily as wins, it is my time to step away from the mic. I know James Gallo cares. He cares about his team. He cares for his city, and he wants to see them have success.
- For Gallo, this is his first Memorial Cup as a broadcaster. I’ve been fortunate to be at five of them, in Quebec City in 2003, in Kelowna in 2004, in London Ontario in 2005, in Rimouski Quebec in 2009 and in Quebec City again in 2015. While many believe being the host broadcaster at the high-profile tournament should be the most enjoyable, I’d argue that it is the most labour intensive, so you can’t properly take in the vibe of the city and all the events outside of the arena. I would regard the 2015 tournament as my favourite, as I made sure I got out and ‘smelled the roses’ of what makes it such a special time in junior hockey
- At the 2015 Memorial Cup I interviewed one parent. Tom Morrissey, who passed in August of 2021 from cancer, is the father of Josh Morrissey. “When Josh got traded to Kelowna, it gave him a real good opportunity for him to play on a team that had a chance to come to a Memorial Cup, but also to play with his brother (Jake),” he told RocketFAN at the time. “We had a good feeling that Bruno Campeses, the GM of the [Prince Albert] Raiders was going to move Josh, obviously to take advantage by getting players for him, but he had a great relationship with Josh and wanted him to have a chance of winning a Memorial Cup. I knew there were two or three teams that were likely linked to a trade, but I think he squeezed hard to get him to play with his brother.”
- While many flaws exist in how the Memorial Cup tournament is conducted as the three league champions and the host team compete for the championship, I still think there is something special about playing beyond just winning a league title. The BCHL, by comparison, has pulled out of Hockey Canada, so its champion is unable to play against the elite for a national title. In my opinion, it would leave a bit of a hollow feeling that you were unable to take that one last step in declaring yourself the best team in the Canada at that specific level of hockey.
- Back in January, the Rockets spent four days in Moose Jaw during our Eastern Division road trip. We were forced to stay there due to difficulties securing a hotel in Regina, which is a more centralized location. Regardless, I walked over to the Moose Jaw Tourist Centre and spoke to the receptionist inside, who was a Warriors season ticket holder and could tell me everything I wanted to know about the hometown team. It is those type of people I think about right now who are relishing the glow of the team’s success.
- Kelowna’s Wayne Pansegrau will be making ice, or making sure the ice is ideal in Saginaw. Pansegrau told RocketFAN he arrived last Wednesday and was busy putting in the logos on the ice and are now building ice to make sure it is ready when the teams practice for the first time on it prior to the tournament starting. Pansegrau is a mainstay at the event, overseeing the ice at the 2023 tournament in Kamloops.
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