Frontenacs applying the finishing touches

While training camp starts on Wednesday, most of the questions regarding the Kingston Frontenacs roster for the 2010-11 Ontario Hockey League season have been answered.

With teams playing fewer exhibition games, draft picks restricted to the time they can stay at a camp to maintain their U.S. college hockey eligibility and veteran players only around a week before going off to pro hockey camps, most OHL teams have sketched out their rosters over the summer.

The Frontenacs certainly are in that category.

While coach Doug Gilmour said he is as eager as anyone to get training camp going, it appears most of the team’s questions are not about who is going to be playing but rather what line each player is on.

Take Michael Fine, for example. The third-year player, who had a career-best 16 goals and 41 points last year while playing most of the time on the wing, could find himself playing centre.

Those are things we haven’t decided. Maybe (Corey) Durocher in the middle or Finer, who can play tough at the position too,” said the 47-year-old Gilmour, who signed a five-year extension with the Frontenacs this summer.

He is looking forward to what will be his second training camp as a head coach. Gilmour became the Frontenacs coach midway through the 2008-09 season.

“I’ve been thinking about (a new season) all summer. There’s been a lot of conversations with (general manager Larry Mavety) on what we’re trying to do here,” Gilmour said.

“I think we’ve got a great defence and goalie and I believe some good forwards, too,” Gilmour said.

High draft picks Alex Gudbranson, Nathan Cull and Warren Steele are the newcomers with the best shot to make the Kingston roster.

Gilmour has 18 players available from a team that finished second in the East Division last season before bowing out in Game 7 of the first round of the playoffs to the Brampton Battalion.

Indeed, the Frontenacs’ camp is shaping up to have less drama than past Septembers.

For starters, the team’s three overage positions already have been decided.

Defenceman Cameron Odam, a tough customer on the back end with his 154 penalty minutes, gets one spot.

Up front, Mike Farrell and Nathan Moon will play as overagers. Moon’s availability is a welcomed surprise for the club. It was thought the Belleville native, although no longer the property of the Pittsburgh Penguins, would move on to a pro league.

“It’s a nice bonus to have him back. He looks good,” said Gilmour, adding that the plans are to move Moon, who enters the season with 258 career points in four OHL seasons, to right wing.

The shift of Moon to the right side is an indication of where most of the intrigue will be found at camp.

Down the middle the Frontenacs will have Ethan Werek and sophomore Alan Quine as a one-two scenario.

Just who ends up on the wing for players like Quine and Werek will be determined through camp scrimmages and exhibition games.

The veterans on the wing include Mitch Lebar, Farrell, Fine and sophomore players Derek Froats and Durocher.

Also into that equation is Colt Kennedy, 19, who left the team last year and ended up playing for the Kingston Kimco Voyageurs.

Kennedy’s talent has never been a question, more so it’s his commitment. Gilmour said the two have talked that out.

“He felt at the end of year that he had made a mistake by going where he had,” Gilmour said.

“He’s committed to coming in and trying to win a spot. I want everybody coming in and doing that.”

The camp will also be void of any goaltending drama. The offseason trade for Philipp Grubauer, the go-to goaltender in the Windsor Spitfires’ successful Memorial Cup campaign last season, makes him the No. 1 man.

Frankie Palazzese, 17, will be the backup.

Gilmour did admit he had learned something from last year when he had Tyler Beskorowany as the team’s starting goaltender.

“We felt with (backup John Cullen) that we didn’t get him in as much because he was hurt. To me, I played Besko a little too much,” Gilmour said.

“I’d like to see Frankie in for 20 to 25 games this season. Doing that would be good for our future.”

Beskorowany played all but 10 of Kingston’s 68 regular-season games last season Grubauer was in 50 games for, first, the Belleville Bulls and Windsor.

Palazzese also will be needed in late December when Grubauer plays for Germany at the world junior championship in Buffalo.

Gilmour said the playoff experience Grubauer brings to the team is important.

“I spoke to the kid (after the trade). I told him we needed his leadership and experience,” said Gilmour

Frontenacs training camp
What:	The team’s Ontario Hockey League training camp begins Wednesday with all draft picks reporting. Veteran players checked in Tuesday.
Where:	At the K-Rock Centre. Scrimmages will be held Thursday and Friday at 9:30 a.m. and 1 p.m.
Camp numbers:	Five goaltenders, 13 defencemen and 22 forwards.
Draft returns:	Twelve of the 14 players Kingston drafted are reporting. Robert Polesello, the team’s fifth-round pick from Toronto, is not attending. He will play for the Vaughan Vipers of the Ontario Junior Hockey League. Seventhround pick Nick Czinder, an American, was traded to Windsor in the deal for goalie Philipp Grubauer. Second-round pick Nathan Cull of Thunder Bay is coming in, but has an injured shoulder.
Import limit:	With Grubauer (Germany) and defenceman Michal Cajkovsky (Slovakia) in camp, the Frontenacs have the OHL maximum two import players.
On the schedule:	Kingston plays its first exhibition game Sunday at 2 p.m. against the Ottawa 67’s at the K-Rock Centre.