Battalion set to open 14th campaign
BRAMPTON, Ont. – With the Brampton Battalion set to open its 14th Ontario Hockey League season at 7:30 p.m. Friday against the visiting Barrie Colts, Stan Butler predicts improvement from a year ago.
“I think we’ll be better than we were last year,” said Butler, the club’s director of hockey operations and head coach.
“The team this year should be more experienced, especially on defence. Not much has changed from last year, so we’re hoping we can reap the benefits of it this year.”
With left winger Michael Mastrangelo having been assigned to the junior A Orangeville Flyers, the 2011-12 edition of the Battalion features 24 players on the opening roster, including nine embarking on their first full seasons of major junior hockey. Left winger Brandon Robinson, a first-round pick in the 2011 OHL Priority Selection, turns 16 on Oct. 13 and is the lone underager.
The Battalion, with 19 players who saw action with the club last season, enters the campaign with eight defencemen in Cameron Wind, Marcus McIvor, Dylan Blujus, Zach Bell, Spencer Abraham, Jordan Auld, Jordan McNaughton and Brenden Miller. McNaughton and Miller appeared in only seven and two games respectively in 2010-11.
“Our young defencemen, Miller and McNaughton, had a good preseason,” said Butler.
Miller, an eighth-round choice, and McNaughton, a 10th-rounder, were chosen in the 2010 OHL Priority Selection.
All but four of the 14 Battalion forwards saw action with the Troops last season. Robinson, centre Patrik Machac, a first-round pick in the Canadian Hockey League’s Import Draft in June, right winger Jordan Poirier and overage left winger Mitchell Porowski would make their OHL regular-season debuts Friday night.
Porowski, who played three seasons with the Gatineau Olympiques, signed as a free agent after clearing waivers in the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League. The Ottawa resident scored 14 goals and earned 15 assists for 29 points in 64 games while drawing 86 penalty minutes with Gatineau last season.
Left winger Adam Lloyd and centre Connor Jarvis also will play their first full seasons with the Battalion. Lloyd appeared in one game last year, while Jarvis played in seven.
Porowski, who turns 20 on Dec. 21, joins left winger Ian Watters and right winger Michael Santini as the team’s overage trio.
Only five returning forwards scored more than 10 goals last season. Winger Barclay Goodrow led the charge with 24, while Watters contributed 20, Santini 19, right winger Philip Lane 17 and centre Sam Carrick 16.
“Up front we hope to be able to find more offence,” said Butler. “We need our Lanes and Carricks and Goodrows and Watters to step up and generate more offence.”
The goaltenders are Matej Machovsky and Keegan Wilson. Wilson, 19, was a ninth-round pick in the OHL Priority Selection in May. He played junior C last season with the Stayner Siskins, compiling a won-lost-extended record of 19-3-0 with six shutouts and a league-leading 2.28 goals-against average.
Wilson posted a won-lost-tied record of 1-3-0 in exhibition action. His lone victory came in a 28-save shutout against the host Peterborough Petes.
Said Butler: “Wilson got better in net as the preseason went on.”
Machovsky, a Czech import who appeared in 18 games with the Battalion last season, won his only exhibition game before leaving for the rookie camp of the National Hockey League’s Ottawa Senators. He rejoined the Troops on Tuesday and is the likely starter against Barrie.
Carrick and Lane were returned to the team Wednesday from camp with the Toronto Maple Leafs and Phoenix Coyotes respectively. Goodrow and Bell have returned from rookie camps with the Carolina Hurricanes and San Jose Sharks respectively but may be held out of the lineup Friday night because of injuries.
Butler said that, in addition to delaying the appointment of a captain, having players away has made it challenging to judge the team’s full potential.
“It’s really hard to tell because the team becomes so disjointed with guys away at NHL camps, but I think once everyone returns we’ll be a good, solid two-way team that’s hard to play against.”
The Battalion, which finished sixth in the Eastern Conference and third in the Central Division last season with a won-lost-extended record of 29-32-7, was swept in four games by the Niagara IceDogs in the first playoff round.
Butler called the division, which also includes the Mississauga St. Michael’s Majors, Sudbury Wolves and Barrie, one of the most competitive in the OHL. Niagara boasts two top-10 picks in the 2011 NHL Entry Draft in Ryan Strome, selected fifth overall by the New York Islanders, and Dougie Hamilton, taken ninth by the Boston Bruins.
“The IceDogs should have a stacked team with Mark Visentin in net, the Hamilton brothers, Freddie and Dougie, Andrew Agozzino and Alex Friesen. They’re going to be really strong. Sudbury has Michael Sgarbossa and that group of guys. St. Michael’s has 13 or 14 guys back from last year’s team that hosted the Memorial Cup, including goaltender J.P. Anderson and Stuart Percy, a Toronto first-round-pick. Barrie has made a lot of trades in the offseason as well as picking up a lot of older players.”
Said Butler: “The main thing is we want to improve every day. From where we start and where we finish, we want to be better. You can never stay the same in life. You can only get better or worse, and we want to have more days where we get better than worse.”
