Category Archives: Rochester Knighthawks

NLL 2014 rosters: Who’s in, who’s out

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Here is a complete list of the changes in rosters for each team compared to last season. The “In” lists contain players that are on the 20-man roster that were not on the final roster from last season, and may include players that were on the practice roster or IR last year. The “Out” lists contain players that were on the final roster last year but are not on the 20-man roster now, and does not include players that are now on one of the other lists (eg. PUP, IR). Players on the Holdout, Physically Unable to Perform (PUP), or Injured Reserve (IR) lists may be moved to the active roster before the season begins.

Names for each list are in alphabetical order.

Buffalo Bandits

In: Ryan Benesch, Kevin Brownell, Troy Cordingley (head coach), Dave Pym (assistant coach), Joe Resetarits, Rory Smith, Andrew Watt
Out: Carter Bender, Nick Cotter, Jon Harasym, Mike Hominuck, Derek Hopcroft, Tracey Kelusky, Darris Kilgour (head coach), Mike McNamara, Luke Wiles
IR: Eric Penney
PUP:
Holdout:
Practice Squad: Colin Boucher, Jordan Critch, Hayden Smith, Mitch Wilde

 

Minnesota Swarm

In: East Division, Cameron Flint, Mike Hobbins, Jordan Houtby, Scott Jones, Jason Noble, Logan Schuss
Out: Dan Ball, Mitch Belisle, Ryan Benesch, Nic Bilic, Jay Card, Evan Kirk, Pat Smith, Corbyn Tao, Andrew Watt, West Division
IR:
PUP: Matt Gibson
Holdout:
Practice Squad:

 

Philadelphia Wings

In: Don Alton, Kyle Buchanan, Blane Harrison (head coach), Tracey Kelusky, Evan Kirk, Brian Megill, Michael Poppleton, John Ranagan, Pat Saunders, Garrett Thul, Ryan Ward
Out: Kevin Buchanan, Ned Crotty, Angus Dinley, Ethan Farrell, Jim Forsythe, Brandon Francis, Kyle Hartzell, Pat Heim, Steve Holmes, John McFadyen, Mike McLellan, Brandon Miller, Johnny Mouradian (head coach), Paul Rabil, Jeff Reynolds, Brian Teuber, Drew Westervelt
IR:
PUP: Rob Campbell, Brendan Mundorf, Max Siebald, Kyle Wailes
Holdout:
Practice Squad: Michael Diehl, Eric Hoffman, Bill McGlone

 

Rochester Knighthawks

In: Mac Allen, Mike Thompson
Out: Mike Accursi, Rory Glaves, Matt Hummel, Kyle Laverty, Jimmy Purves, Jon Sullivan
IR: Jamie Batson
PUP: Angus Goodleaf, Zac Reid
Holdout:
Practice Squad: Wenster Green, Mark White

 

Toronto Rock

In: Craig England, Dan Ladouceur (assistant coach), John Lovell (head coach), Blaine Manning (assistant coach), Ethan O’Connor
Out: Troy Cordingley (head coach), Scott Evans, Mike Hobbins, Blaine Manning, Brendan Thenhaus, Roger Vyse, Cam Woods
IR:
PUP:
Holdout:
Practice Squad: Dustin Dunn, Eric Law, Jeff Swift, Mike Lum-Walker

 

Calgary Roughnecks

In: Peter Dubenski, Cody Hawkins, Karsen Leung, Garrett McIntosh, Tor Reinholdt
Out: Jackson Decker, Nolan Heavenor, Aaron Pascas, Joe Resetarits
IR:
PUP: Travis Cornwall, Pete McFetridge, Scott Ranger
Holdout:
Practice Squad: Brett Baron, Scott Carnegie, Jake Hayes, Barclay Hickey

 

Colorado Mammoth

In: Cameron Mann, Bob Snider, Dillon Ward, Drew Westervelt
Out: Mac Allen, Joel Delgarno, Ilija Gajic, Jaeden Gastaldo, Ian Hawksbee, Ryan Hotaling, Dan Lewis, Richard Morgan, Jarrett Park, Gavin Prout, Rory Smith
IR:
PUP:
Holdout: Casey Powell
Practice Squad:

 

Edmonton Rush

In: Nic Bilic, Robert Church, Riley Loewen, Jimmy Quinlan (defensive coach), Adrian Sorichetti, Dane Stevens
Out: Mike Burke, Mike Cudmore, Jimmy Quinlan (player), Ryan Ward, Devan Wray (defensive coach)
IR:
PUP: Corey Small
Holdout:
Practice Squad: Mitch Bannister, Jarrett Toll, Alex Turner

 

Vancouver Stealth

In: Cody Bremner, Tyler Digby, Alex Gajic, Ilija Gajic, Brett Hickey, Sean Lundstrom
Out: Kyle Buchanan, Tim Henderson, Dean Hill, Athan Iannucci, Mitch Jones, Justin Pychel, Bob Snider
IR: Brett Bucktooth, Mitch McMichael
PUP:
Holdout:
Practice Squad: Josh Hawkins, Neil Tyacke, Chris Wardle, Nick Weiss

Preseason game report: Rochester 12 @ Toronto 6

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Both the Toronto Rock and the Rochester Knighthawks are now 1-1 in the preseason after the defending champs defeated the Rock 12-6 at the TRAC on Saturday night. Each team was missing some players who will likely be in their opening-day lineups; Rochester was missing Mike Accursi and Craig Point while the Rock were down Garrett Billings, Stephen Leblanc, Bill Greer, and Sandy Chapman. I didn’t hear any announcement about one of the Knighthawk goalies being scratched, implying that they dressed all three, but Matt Vinc played the whole game and looked really good. Nick Rose played most of the game, though exactly how much I don’t know; I suppose I wasn’t paying enough attention. At one point the Rock switched goalies but Rosey came in while Zak Boychuk went out. I have no idea how long Boychuk had been in there. (According to the game report on torontorock.com, Boychuk was only in for a few seconds.)

The Knighthawks played a strong game, as you might expect from the two-time defending champions. Dan Dawson was his usual dominant self, and Cody Jamieson continues to make his presence felt. Jesse Gamble, for instance, felt his presence pretty well early in the game, as Jamieson simply devastated Gamble with a huge open-ice hit.  The Rock didn’t have a great game offensively, which should be obvious from the fact that they only scored 6 goals. There seemed to be a lot of passes around the perimeter but the whole “one guy draws a double-team allowing someone to get free in front of the net” just didn’t happen (perhaps because Billings is usually the guy who’s double-teamed), and the Knighthawk defense forced the Rock to take lots of low-percentage shots. Vinc was more than up to the task for those.

Nick Rose played well but not great. He made the simple stops, but I still think he gives up too many rebounds. I guess it’s no big deal if the Rock pick it up or Rose makes the second save as well, but when the other team scores on a shot they shouldn’t have had, that’s frustrating.

It was quite a physical game too. No actual fights, but there were the beginning of several and quite a lot of shoving that came to either nothing or coincident roughing minors. Paul Dawson had at least three penalties, and I was convinced that a Dawson / Craig England fight was inevitable. Or possibly Dawson / Damon Edwards. Or  Powless / Edwards. Or even Burton / Doyle. Doyle actually had two penalties in the game; I wonder if he’s changing his game to be more of an Andrew Suitor type: the captain AND the team penalty minute leader. Hmmmm….. Nah.

It’s wasn’t quite the rookie-fest that the last game was, though the Rock had about five in the lineup. Craig England looks like he might battle Scott Johnston for the enforcer role on the team, while Dustin Dunn and Ethan O’Connor played a lot of minutes on defense. The Rock look to be a quick transitioning team this year, with Gamble, Marshall, Edwards, Chapman, Dunn, and O’Connor all able to turn the ball around quickly. They even have a guy named Swift!

Speaking of Swift, he and Eric Law both had pretty solid games on offense, particularly Law. He scored a couple, and looked pretty comfortable as part of the offense. I didn’t think Brendan Thenhaus had a particularly strong game, and wouldn’t be surprised to see him dropped to the practice roster.

Other game notes:

  • In the second quarter, a Rock player took a shot that Ian Llord managed to save while standing in the crease – right in front of Matt Vinc. Nice save for a non-goalie (see below), but why was Llord even there – in the crease, standing directly in front of his own goalie?
  • Near the end of the game, the Rock had pulled Nick Rose for an extra attacker. After a turnover, Rose tried to get back to the net before the Knighthawks transition man but it was immediately clear that he had no chance to make it. Colin Doyle could and did, but did not make the save. You may remember that Doyle played goal for almost ten minutes of a Mann Cup game this past summer, when both Six Nations goalies were tossed from the game for using illegal equipment. From all accounts, he did a decent job.
  • There was a guy with a cowbell who would pound on it every time the Rock gained possession of the ball. (He was there last week too.) My eleven-year-old son looked up the first time he heard it and said “Wow, that’s annoying.” Yup.
  • After a shot hit either Vinc or the crossbar and went high in the air, Paul Dawson reached up and caught it on the way down. Josh Sanderson then smacked the ball out of Dawson’s stick, grabbed it, and took a quick shot. Didn’t score, but the fact that Sanderson, who’s not known for his defensive prowess, stripped the ball away from Paul Dawson, who’s probably ten inches taller, was pretty impressive.
  • Not a single goal from behind the net, though Doyle tried one. Good news for Rosey. Considering the length of Dan Dawson’s arms, that’s a bit surprising.
  • Despite there being a crazy huge snowstorm in southern Ontario, there was a pretty good crowd on hand. I drove in from Waterdown, and the QEW wasn’t great but wasn’t terrible. I don’t really need lane markers anyway.

Gavin Prout – the Knighthawk?

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Gavin Prout spent two seasons in New York and then six in Colorado, the last five as captain of the Mammoth, averaging 84 points per season. So it was a bit of a shock in Colorado, and throughout the NLL world, when he was traded in 2009 to the Edmonton Rush. He played with the Rush for the 2010 season and about half of 2011 before being traded back to the Mammoth. But something that many people, myself included until recently, don’t remember about Prout being traded from the Mammoth to the Rush was that it never happened.

What could have beenProut, along with Andrew Potter, was traded from the Mammoth to the Rochester Knighthawks in 2009 for Ilija Gajic (some draft picks were involved as well). Potter had been sent to the Mammoth from the Knighthawks the previous year in the deal that brought Gary Gait out of retirement. Interesting that a guy that played all of five games in his NLL career was involved in two such significant trades. Anyway, two weeks later, the Knighthawks sent Prout and Dean Hill to the Rush for a first round draft pick. But the fact that Prout was a Knighthawk for a couple of off-season weeks is usually forgotten.

A number of other players also spend time on teams for which they never played. Here are just a few:

After the Boston Blazers folded, Anthony Cosmo and Josh Sanderson were both selected in the dispersal draft by the Minnesota Swarm. Before the first round of the draft had even ended, Sanderson had been traded to the Rock, while Cosmo sat out half of the next season before being traded to the Bandits.

Shawn Williams is another player who, like Sanderson, can measure the amount of time he spent on the Minnesota roster with a stopwatch. In July 2012, Williams was traded from the Rush to the Swarm for two second-round draft picks. The same day, he was sent off with Brendan Doran as well as the #5 overall pick in the 2012 draft and two other 2012 draft picks to Buffalo for the #3 overall pick. That seems to me like an expensive way to move up two positions – and in fact, it really only moved the Swarm up one position since they went from having picks #2, 4, and 5 to having picks #2, 3, and 4.

Paul Rabil might be the only player to have joined two separate organizations consecutively and never play for either of them. But this story begins six months before Rabil got involved. In the summer of 2011, the Wings traded Athan Iannucci, Alex Turner, Brodie MacDonald, and three first round draft picks to the Rush for Brodie Merrill, Dean Hill, Mike McLellan, and a couple of later draft picks. Nooch never signed with the Rush, and a month into the 2012 season, he was traded to the Stealth for Paul Rabil. Rabil also refused to sign with the Rush and sat out the rest of the 2012 season.

Almost a year after the original Iannucci trade, the Rush sent Rabil to the Knighthawks for Jarrett Davis, but Rabil never reported to Rochester either. Only a couple of weeks before the 2013 season began, he was sent to Philadelphia along with Jordan Hall, Joel White, and Robbie Campbell in exchange for Dan Dawson, Paul Dawson, and a first round draft pick. Rabil is now happy in Philadelphia, and I’m pretty sure the Knighthawks were OK with what they got out of the deal.

But not every player was traded to a team they never played for. Here are some players who were drafted by teams they never played for:

  • Ilija Gajic, Rochester, 2009
  • Joel Dalgarno, Toronto, 2009
  • Craig Point, Boston, 2007
  • Ryan Benesch, San Jose, 2006
  • Blaine Manning, Calgary, 2001
  • Geoff Snider, Vancouver, 2001 (he opted to return to university and was drafted again by the Wings in 2006)
  • Tom Marechek, Buffalo, 1992
  • John Tavares, Detroit, 1991 (and not until the third round!)

I’m sure there are plenty of others. Leave a comment if I missed any!

The top 10 one-team NLL players

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Last week, Down Goes Brown did a post (actually on Grantland.com) called The 10 Greatest One-Team NHL Players. Since DGB is unlikely to cover lacrosse anytime soon, I decided to do it myself. Given that there are fewer teams in the NLL, the history is much shorter, and there has been far more team movement than the NHL, there really aren’t all that many such players. If we restrict ourselves to players with more than 50 games in their NLL careers, all with a single team, we find that there are only 54 of them. But there are still some pretty good names on this list.

Incidentally, DGB is one of the funniest sports blogs anywhere. If you’re a hockey fan, I strongly recommend it.

So without further ado, here are the top 10 players who spent their entire NLL careers with one team. The number of games listed includes playoff games. I’m restricting the number of games played to 100 or more, since it’s not quite fair to put people like Cody Jamieson (54 games) or Garrett Billings (72 games) on this list so early in their careers.

10. Jeremy Hollenbeck, Rochester Knighthawks (127 games)

Jeremy Hollenbeck

Hollenbeck played ten seasons with the Knighthawks, winning a Championship in 1997. In 2011, he was inducted into the Rochester Knighthawks Hall of Fame.

9. Dan Ladouceur, Toronto Rock (150 games)

Dan Ladouceur

In the early 2000’s, Laddy was one of the anchors of the best defense in the NLL, along with guys like Jim Veltman, Glenn Clark, Terry Bullen, and Pat Coyle. He even scored a goal or two here and there (I distinctly remember a breakaway where he ran up the floor frantically looking around for someone to pass to, then buried it himself), including one in the 2002 Championship game. At about 6’6″ he was an imposing figure and a good fighter too (see above, having a chat with Shawn Evans), though I did once see him dropped with one punch. In a 2002 fight in Toronto, Matt Green hit him with a shot to the jaw that knocked him unconscious.

I have heard rumours that the Rock were not allowed to trade Ladouceur because of his job as a Durham Regional police officer (I believe he’s on the SWAT team), but I confirmed with Laddy himself that it’s not true. He said they could have traded him at any time but they were a classy organization and worked with him.

8. Peter Jacobs, Philadelphia Wings (158 games)

Peter Jacobs

As good a face-off guy as Geoff Snider is, he’s only matched Peter Jacobs’ high of 318 face-off wins in a season once. (The all-time record is 319 by Bob Snider in 2012.) Jacobs is also the only person not named Snider to ever have a face-off percentage above 70% for a season. Jacobs played 12 seasons for the Wings, winning just shy of 60% of almost 3,000 face-offs. He didn’t finish a single one of those seasons with a percentage below 50%.

7. Jake Bergey, Philadelphia Wings (142 games)

Jake Bergey

Bergey played ten seasons in Philly and won two Championships. He scored 50+ points six times, including 86 in 14 games in 2001. He’s currently second all-time in Wings goals, assists, and points.

In the 2007 expansion draft, he was chosen by the Boston Blazers, but was traded back to Philly before the season started. Then the Blazers sat out the 2008 season so there was another expansion draft. Bergey was chosen by Boston again, and again was traded back to the Wings. He has to be one of the few players who played for a single team his entire career and yet was traded twice.

6. Andrew McBride, Calgary Roughnecks (185 games)

Andrew McBride

McBride has played 11 seasons in Calgary, and has been the captain since Tracey Kelusky was traded after the 2010 season. He’s a defender, transition player, a fighter, an outstanding team leader, and you’ll never hear a more well-spoken guy during an interview. And when is Movember time of year, he is look like Borat.

5. Rich Kilgour, Buffalo Bandits (225 games)

Rich Kilgour

Darris’ big brother was captain of the Bandits for 12 years, won four championships, had his number retired by the Bandits and is in the NLL Hall of Fame. Only one player personifies the Bandits better than Richie Kilgour and, well, we’ll get to him later.

4. Regy Thorpe, Rochester Knighthawks (217 games)

Regy Thorpe

Regy Thorpe was a big tough defender who played an amazing fifteen seasons with the Knighthawks, beginning in 1995, the team’s first season in the league. He won two Championships and was captain of the 2007 Championship team. But most interestingly, he was the first player-GM in NLL history when he took the reins of the team and played in the 2009 season. His tenure as a GM only lasted one season before owner Curt Styres took over, but much to the chagrin of NLL scorers, Thorpe played one more season before retiring in 2010.

3. Blaine Manning, Toronto Rock (199 games)

Blaine Manning

Blaine Manning had a pretty successful start to his NLL career, winning championships in 3 of his first 4 seasons (2002, 2003, 2005) with the Toronto Rock. It kind of went downhill after that for a couple of years, but after The Rock GM Who Must Not Be Named was fired and Terry Sanderson was brought back, Manning was a big part of the rebuilding process that resulted in the 2011 NLL Championship. Long before Dan Dawson arrived in Boston, Manning was one of the original Big Three along with Colin Doyle and Josh Sanderson in Toronto. They peaked in 2005 when Doyle finished first overall in scoring, Manning tied with John Grant for second, and Sanderson tied with John Tavares for third – and all five of them finished with over 100 points.

I went on and on about Manning in an article right after he retired, so I won’t rehash all his stats here. Suffice it to say that Manning should be a lock for the NLL Hall of Fame once he is eligible.

2. Tom Marechek, Philadelphia Wings (161 games)

Tom Marechek

Tom “Hollywood” Marechek won four championships in 12 NLL seasons and was inducted into the NLL Hall of Fame in 2007. Marechek is the all-time Wings leader in both goals and assists, and is 8th all-time in the league in goals. But of the top goal-scorers in league history, only one player in the top 10 (and two in the top 25) have played fewer games than Marechek. The only players who averaged more goals per game than Marechek are Gary Gait, Paul Gait, John Grant, and John Tavares. Not bad company.

Hard to believe he’s only the third-best lacrosse player from Victoria, BC.

1. John Tavares, Buffalo Bandits (313 games)

John Tavares

No-brainer. Tavares is one of the best players ever to play in the NLL (many argue he is the best), and after 22 seasons with the Buffalo Bandits, there’s no argument who’s at the top of this list. Or most lists, for that matter.

Tavares owns pretty much every offensive NLL record, most of them by a mile. As of the end of the 2013 season, he has 778 career goals, ahead of second-place Gary Gait by 130 and ahead of third-place (and the closest still active player) John Grant by over 200. He has 887 assists, 108 more than Colin Doyle. He has 1665 points; if he retired today, second place Doyle couldn’t catch him even with four more 100 point seasons. He’s scored an amazing 5.95 points per game over his career, second only to John Grant’s 6.37. (Technically he’s also behind a guy named Gary Edmands with a career average of 6 – he scored 6 points in his only NLL game with the Bandits in 1996.)

Since Tavares is still active, the amazing numbers will just continue to climb.

Honourable mentions

  • Billy Dee Smith, Buffalo Bandits, 149 games
  • Pat McCabe, New York Saints, 119 games
  • Mike Carnegie, Calgary Roughnecks, 105 games
  • Kyle Sorensen, San Jose / Washington Stealth, 105 games (I know, two different teams but they’re the same franchise so it counts.)

Just under the radar

These guys didn’t quite make the 100 game limit, but I wanted to acknowledge them anyway.

  • Devan Wray, Calgary Roughnecks, 99 games
  • Jeff Zywicki, San Jose / Washington Stealth, 99 games
  • Sal LoCascio, New York Saints, 95 games

2013 NLL season wrap-up

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Well, that’s it for one of the most exciting and entertaining NLL seasons ever, thanks in part to the parity in the league. Almost every game was unpredictable, and there wasn’t a single game all year where anyone would have been honestly shocked if the losing team had won. Incidentally, that’s my excuse for finishing below .500 in my predictions.

A lot of interesting things happened in the 2013 season, some of which were expected, some of which were not. Let’s take a look at a few of each.

Five things we expected

  1. Parity. As I mentioned above, the parity in the league is unprecedented. The Bandits only won 6 games, but four of them came against the Champions, the Championship runners-up, and the Rock, who had the best record. The team with the best record was ahead of the team with the worst record by only 4 wins (10-6 vs. 6-10), the smallest that number has been since Detroit finished 6-2 and four teams were 3-5 back in 1992.
  2. The Stealth didn’t suck. Nobody expected their 2012 season to be as bad as it was, but I’m pretty sure that nobody realistically expected it to happen again.
  3. Garrett Billings cemented himself as one of the top offensive players in the NLL with his second-straight 100-point season.
  4. After one of the best offensive seasons ever, John Grant returned to earth with a pedestrian (for him) 91 points. Matt Vinc
  5. Matt Vinc won his third Goaltender of the Year award. Another few years of this type of performance, and the “best of all time” argument between Watson and Eliuk will become a three-way conversation. In fact, it’s almost there now.

Five things we didn’t expect

  1. Sophomore slump? Never heard of it. If you look at the top rookies of 2012 – Kevin Crowley, Adam Jones, Jordan MacIntosh, Tyler Carlson, Evan Kirk, Johnny Powless – only Kirk dropped off significantly from his rookie performance. Powless dropped from 50 points to 40, but he had to start sharing the ball with the likes of Dan Dawson and Casey Powell. The rest all stayed about the same or got better.
  2. Getting rid of Casey Powell won’t hurt your offense. The Knighthawks averaged 11.1 goals per game before the trade, 11.3 after. Cody Jamieson and Dan Dawson both saw their points/game averages go up to make up for the loss of Powell, Dawson from 4.2 to 5.1, and Jamieson from 5 to 6.3.
  3. Mike Poulin had a distinctly un-Poulin-esque season. His 12.70 GAA was the highest of his career, almost 2.5 points higher than 2012. The only starters who finished with higher GAAs were Evan Kirk and Anthony Cosmo. But his performance in the Roughnecks’ 12-11 OT victory over Edmonton at the end of the season was outstanding, and he played well against both the Mammoth and the Stealth in the playoffs. Shawn Evans
  4. Shawn Evans has been a very good player for years, and taking his game to the next level wasn’t wholly unexpected. But this year, Evans jumped the next level and went to the one after that. He bested his career high in points by 33 and won the scoring title by 12. His 112 points is tied for the 5th best season ever, putting Evans among the Gaits, Grants, and Tavares’.
  5. The Knighthawks started the year 0-3, were never above .500 at any point, and only two teams scored fewer goals. But they are the Champions. Actually, we should have expected it, since it’s almost what they did last year.

So there’ll be no more NLL games until at least December when training camps open. Don’t worry folks, it’s only… um… seven months. (sigh) Until then, we still have the MLL for outdoorsy types, and the MSL and WLA for people who like sweating in arenas in July. There may or may not be other American indoor leagues as well, such as NALL, PLL, MILA, and possibly others; so many of them started up so fast I kind of lost track of which ones still exist.

So enjoy your summer and fall, whether it’s filled with lacrosse or not! NLL Chatter will be more or less quiet over the summer, but we’ll publish the odd story as things unfold: the new CBA, trades, the entry draft, rule changes, the 2014 schedule, things like that. And we’ll be back next season with the usual mix of relevance and irreverence. See you then!

Championship game pick

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I went .500 during both the first and second weeks of the playoffs, and all I know about the third week is that I won’t go .500.

Regular season record: 33-39 (.458)
Playoff record: 3-3 (.500)

Game

Comments

Pick
ROC @ WAS Neither team had their best regular season, but the regular season means zilch at this point. There are great coaches at both ends. Given the breakdown below and adding in the home-ish floor advantage, I have to go with the Stealth. Stealth4

Goaltending: Richards vs. Vinc is one of the best goaltending matchups in a Championship game in recent years. I’d call that a draw but if I had to pick one, I’d probably give Vinc a slight edge.

Offense: We have Duch, Ratcliff, Nooch, Bucktooth, Hill, and Smith on one side and Jamieson, Dawson, Powless, Vitarelli, Point, and Accursi on the other. Powerful on both sides, but I’m giving the Stealth the edge there, especially if Jamieson and Vitarelli are not at 100%.

Defense/Transition: Rochester has the Selfs, Dawson, Smith, Kirk, and McCready but the Stealth has Sorensen, Grimes, Moleski, Garrison, Snider, Henderson, and Beers. Again, both are strong, but Washington wins there.

How do we avoid moving the Championship game? And should we avoid it?

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Yesterday, we talked about the 2013 NLL Championship game being held in Langley, BC because of scheduling issues at Comcast Arena. But could this have been avoided? Yes. How?

Money.

It would have been relatively easy to avoid, actually, though pricey. When the regular season schedule was being made, the NLL would have figured out when the final week of the season was going to be. Each team would then book the Saturday night of the next weekend for the Division Semi-Finals, the Saturday night of the following weekend for the Division Finals, and the Saturday night of the next weekend for the Finals. If they wanted to be really thorough, they would have booked Friday night, Saturday, and Sunday of all three weekends. Then there’s no chance that the arena would be booked for the playoffs, and everything’s good. Right?

Well, yes, except that for most teams, booking their arena for three entire weekends in a row during the NHL playoffs is completely impossible. Every NLL team except Washington and Rochester has an NHL team playing in the same arena. In every one of those cases (even the ones where the NHL team doesn’t own the building), I’ll give you one guess which team would get priority during those weekends. Hint: the answer rhymes with NOT LACROSSE.

So let’s say we decide that some playoff games are going to be Friday night, some Saturday night, and some Sunday afternoon, and the building owners all agree with the dates. Now the team owners have to pay for those dates, and I don’t imagine that paying to rent the ACC or Rexall Place is overly cheap. In fact, since there are only 8 home games (for now) and you just added three more, you’ve increased your arena costs by 37.5%. Sure, most teams will be able to cancel one or all of those dates eventually and presumably get some of their money back, but (a) you might not be able to cancel the dates until a week before, and b) there will very likely be a steep financial penalty (even more so because of the late notice). The non-hockey-team NLL owners (Toronto, Washington, Edmonton, Philadelphia, Rochester) are used to putting down their own money knowing they’re unlikely to get it all back, but they’re only so altruistic, and frankly I think it’s unfair to expect the owners to pay that out of their own pockets. The franchises or the league would have to foot the bill, and I’m pretty sure there just isn’t that much money floating around the NLL’s bank accounts.

Is every ticket-buying fan in the league interested in bumping ticket prices across the board to avoid the exceptionally slim possibility of both (a) their team making it to the finals and (b) the arena not being available? Some might, others won’t. It wasn’t the case this year with the parity we currently have, but some years it’s obvious from the start that one or more teams are just not good enough to make the finals. Would fans of those teams want an increase in ticket prices so they could book their arena for a Championship game that they have almost no chance of hosting?

I would think that if such a decision had to be made, pissing off a few fans in one city by moving the Championship game is the lesser of two evils when compared with pissing off more fans in all the NLL cities.

So yes, it could have been avoided. But the only real way to do it is by spending money that the league doesn’t have. Maybe when negotiating the TV deal for next season, the league could try and squeeze a few more bucks out of it, and then use that extra to book the arenas. But with all due respect to Stealth fans, in my opinion it really isn’t a big enough or frequent enough problem to warrant spending bucketloads of money on solving.

Langley hosts the NLL Championship

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The NLL Championship game in 2013 will, for the first time, be held in a neutral site arena, kind of: the Langley Events Centre in Langley, BC. Langley is about 90 miles north of Everett and is the closest arena that the Stealth could find to host the game. Comcast Arena, the normal home of the Stealth, is booked this Saturday for a Christian music concert. The Key Arena in Seattle, a much closer alternative, is also booked with roller derby, and thanks to the CBS Sports TV contract, changing the date was not an option, so the Stealth were forced to either go to Langley or give up the game and allow the Knighthawks to host.

This would have been more than a little ironic, since a similar thing happened in 2007 when the Knighthawks were unable to host the Championship game because of a circus booked at the Blue Cross Arena. The Knighthawks had to win their first Championship in ten years in front of the fans of their opponents, the Arizona Sting.

The Langley Events Centre

There’s been a lot of talk on twitter and on the IL Indoor forums about this, most of which is negative, and phrases like “unprofessional” and even “bush league” have been thrown around. So I asked on twitter “How would you have solved the problem? Here are some of the responses:

@Amypriddy12: put the game in Rochester where they could sell out the arena…

@bradmacarthur: hold it in Rochester? ’07 games was moved to AZ when BCA wasn’t available.

@tfernaays: The same way the did in 2007: give the other team the game.

@RichCumpston: Just play it in Rochester, like they did in 2007 when Arizona couldn’t host it.

Is it just me, or is there a trend here? Yes, the option to move the game to Rochester was likely the next step if Langley was unavailable. The difference between this case and 2007 is that in Rochester’s case, there was no alternative. Presumably there are other arenas in the Rochester area, but if it’s too small, the league won’t want to hold the game there. If you think moving the final game to another arena is bush league, try televising a national championship on CBS Sports from a dinky little arena that holds 300 people. Any other arenas that might have been even close to the BCA in terms of capacity were booked, and the Board of Governors nixed an idea to hold the game in Buffalo. The only option at that point was to move it to Arizona.

In this case, there is another option available, and that’s Langley. Yes, the fans will have to drive a couple of hours north and cross the Canadian border, but if it’s either that or watch it on TV from Rochester, I imagine most Stealth fans will make the drive – or at least they’ll be happy that they have that decision to make.

I did get one other suggestion:

@GlenMcDole: I believe in the early 90s, highest attendance city held it. Denver would be a good place this year

On the surface, this seems like a decent idea – this way, you’re rewarding the city that has the most fans, and making fans happy is certainly good for the league. But first off, it means that most years, the Championship game is in a neutral site unless the team with the highest attendance also happens to make the finals. This is fine for the Super Bowl, where a city needs to prepare for a year just to host the game, but that’s not the case in the NLL.

Secondly, it would mean that the NLL would have the Championship in Colorado or Buffalo every year. Could this increase attendance in the other cities, with fans trying to get the Championship there? That seems like the goal, but I honestly doubt it would have any impact on attendance. Even if it does, it wouldn’t help the fans in small arenas (ironically, I believe Rochester and Washington are the two smallest). Buffalo’s First Niagara Centre can hold over 19,000, and the Bandits had that many out to their final game. But most of the other arenas just plain can’t hold that many people. Everyone in the entire City of Rochester could be lining up for Knighthawks tickets, but only 11k of them can fit in the arena, and so without building a new 20,000-seat arena, Rochester would have no chance of ever hosting a final. That’s unfair to them.

The league could make provisions, saying no team can host twice in a row, or that they alternate between the top three, or base it on the average percentage of capacity, but quite honestly, these schemes are starting to sound hokey to me.

Personally, I think the highest-seeded team that makes the final has earned the right to host it, and so that’s where it should be held. If that’s not possible, as is the case this year and was in 2007, the home team should be allowed to attempt to find an alternate location for the game, within reason. If the Stealth had said “Yes, the arena we used to use in San Jose is available, we’ll play there”, that’s no good since they’re well over 800 miles apart. Asking fans to travel that far is silly, though I understand the complaints about having to cross the border.

Does this suck for Stealth fans? Of course it does. But could it have been avoided? Check back tomorrow for the answer.

Division final picks

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I went 2-2 in last week’s first-round games, just as I did in the first round last year. I continue to get the Stealth completely backwards – they lose when I pick them to win and vicy versy. I knew the Swarm were going to be a tough opponent for the Rock, but not that tough. The predictions only get tougher from here. Hopefully I do better than my Swarm @ Rock finals prediction from 2012.

Regular season record: 33-39 (.458)
Playoff record: 2-2 (.500)

Game

Comments

Pick
MIN @ ROC After watching the Swam dismantle the Rock last weekend, it’s hard to bet against them. Knowing that Cody Jamieson will be at best playing hurt (and more likely not playing at all) and they may also be without Cory Vitarelli doesn’t help the Knighthawks’ cause. But I agree with Teddy Jenner: if the Swarm don’t start Tyler Carlson after his recent performances, they’re nuts. Carlson vs. Vinc – this will be a great goalie battle. Swarm
WAS @ CAL Was this one ever tough to call. Both teams have it all. Great goaltending? Check. Lots of firepower up front? Check. Transition? Defense? Great faceoff guy named Snider? Check, check, check. The biggest difference here is coaching. Chris Hall was my second choice for the Les Bartley award and has taken the Stealth to the Championship in 2 of the last 3 years, while Curt Malawsky is a rookie. Gary Gait won the championship as a rookie coach so there’s precedent there, but I still think I’m gonna have to give this one to the Stealth. Stealth

2013 NLL Award winners

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Every year the IL Indoor writing staff submit their picks for the annual NLL awards, and here are mine. Note that these are not picks for who I think will win, they’re picks for who I think should win.

Offensive player of the year – Shawn Evans

Runners-up: Garrett Billings, Rhys Duch, Callum Crawford

Billings had almost as great a season in 2013 as he did in 2012, and Duch set personal records in both goals (leading the league) and assists. Crawford only had 4 games (out of 14) with less than 6 points – none of them after March 3 – and had six straight games of 8+ points. But Evans had them all beat before he even began his final game. Evans had five games with 10+ points, more than John Grant had during his record-setting 2012 season, while only Crawford and Dan Dawson even had two.

Transition player of the year – Jesse Gamble

Runners-up: Geoff Snider, Jeremy Thompson, Brad Self

Is this a bit of a homer pick? Possibly, but I really thought Gamble had a hell of a year. He played strong defense, ran like the wind, scored a bunch of goals (including two on the power-play), and led the team in loose balls.

I thought about picking Jordan MacIntosh, who will probably win the award, but decided against it for the same reason I didn’t think Jeff Shattler should have won this award two years ago – he’s not really a transition player. He’s an excellent player, no question, and as good as he was, he even stepped up his game when Andrew Suitor went down with a season-ending injury. But he played a lot more shifts on offense than he did defense. In the division semi-final game, MacIntosh played as much offense as Benesch or Crawford did. Gamble is a true transition player.

Defensive player of the year  – Kyle Rubisch

Runners-up: Chris Corbeil, Scott Self

It sounds like Kyle Rubisch might be the winner of this award every year for the foreseeable future. The word I hear most often to describe his play is “beast”.

Goaltender of the year – Matt Vinc

Runners-up: Brandon Miller, Tyler Richards, Nick Rose

If not for Matt Vinc, the Knighthawks might have been hitting the links early, not the Bandits. To have a goalie with the best GAA and the best save percentage in the league and still finish at .500 tells you how bad their offense was. Similarly, as one Wings fan put it, the Wings would be 1-15 without Brandon Miller. I’m not sure it would have been that bad but the Wings had a similar problem to the Knighthawks – outstanding goaltending, but almost no offense to speak of.

Rookie of the year – Mark Matthews

Runners-up: Kiel Matisz, Shayne Jackson, Dhane Smith, Curtis Knight

From a stats point of view, it was closer than you might have thought. Matthews had 4.31 points per game, while Jackson and Matisz had 4.00 and 3.94 respectively. But Matthews turned the Rush’s mediocre offense from last year into the third highest-scoring in the league, and that’s after losing Aaron Wilson, Scott Evans, and Shawn Williams. Obviously Matthews himself didn’t make up the difference entirely, but he forced opposing defenses to focus on him. This opened things up for Ryan Ward, Corey Small, and Zack Greer, all of whom increased their point totals over 2012.

Unsung player of the year – Cory Vitarelli

Runners-up: Kasey Beirnes, Jay Thorimbert, Brodie MacDonald

When you think of the offensive stars on the Knighthawks, you think Jamieson, Dawson, Powless, Accursi, Point, even Keogh, but Vitarelli doesn’t always spring to mind. But he was third in team scoring, put up at least a point in every game he played this year, and scored some of the prettiest goals we saw all season. Beirnes has gotten more recognition in the last year or two for his hard work playing behind big-name guys like Doyle, Billings, and Sanderson, but he’s been doing that for years. Jay Thorimbert had almost identical face-off numbers to Bob Snider, which is impressive in itself. Thorimbert split face-off duties in 2012 with Brandon Francis and Jeremy Thompson, but became the Bandits’ only face-off man this year – and increased their team face-off win percentage from 48.3% to 59.7%. Brodie MacDonald only played in three games this year, but put in at least 20 minutes in each, and finished with a GAA of around 8 and a save percentage of 80%. Having that kind of backup goalie behind you has to be a great confidence boost for both Aaron Bold and Derek Keenan.

Coach of the year – Troy Cordingley

Runners-up: Chris Hall, Derek Keenan

The Rock were the most consistent team this year, in a league where many teams looked unstoppable one week and terrible the next. Chris Hall showed how important he is to the Stealth, bringing them back from their brutal 2012 season, much of which was played without him, to second place in the West.

GM of the year – Derek Keenan

Runners-up: John Arlotta, Curt Styres

Drafting Mark Matthews wasn’t the master stroke – every GM would have done that. But in the off-season, Keenan retooled the offense, turning them from the worst in the league to the third-highest scoring – and managed to do this despite losing Shawn Williams, Aaron Wilson, and Scott Evans. Keenan also turned Paul Rabil, a player who never played for him and wasn’t going to, into Jarrett Davis.

MVP – Shawn Evans

Shawn EvansRunners-up: Garrett Billings, Callum Crawford, Matt Vinc

Evans had an outstanding year. He led the league in both assists and points, almost setting records in both, and beat his next closest teammate by almost fifty points. He had almost exactly the season Garrett Billings had a year ago, and Billings was my choice for MVP then. How close were their seasons?

G A Pts PPG LB Shots SOG
Billings 2012 32 82 114 10 74 195 131
Evans 2013 32 80 112 12 69 186 139

Evans had the same number of goals as he did last season but picked up 33 more assists. Just to cap it all off, Evans scored the overtime winner in the last game of the season to clinch the Western division for the Roughnecks.