Keeping up team morale in losing season has been difficult, but not impossible for Rebels captain
As the captain of the Red Deer Rebels, it’s been a responsibility of Grayson Pawlenchuk to help maintain positive team morale in a season that’s been beyond frustrating for the players and coaching staff.
Overall, he feels it’s been a successful project, but also one that has come with plenty of challenges for a club that after a pair of weekend home-ice setbacks sits last overall in the Western Hockey League.
“It hasn’t been too bad,” he said Monday. “It’s obviously tough when you’re losing like we are, it’s something no team wants to go through.
“But we’re just trying to look at the positives like the last game when we thought that we worked pretty hard and tried to do everything right. We can take the positives out of that game (a 3-1 loss to visiting Kamloops) and try to build from there. The game before that (a 5-1 home-ice loss to Prince Albert) we didn’t play well so we look at the negatives there and realize we have to fix that.
“But we just try to keep our heads up. Everyone knows it’s tough, we know what we’re going through. Definitely with a lot of young guys here, we have to bring some positive energy to help them out.”
The Rebels have brought some of their problems on themselves, and the fact they’re likely the youngest team in the league hasn’t helped matters.
But Lady Luck hasn’t exactly been kind to them either. The Rebels have lost a mind-boggling 11 consecutive games that have gone to extra time and have been the victims of bad fortune on other nights.
A prime example is Saturday’s defeat at the hands of the Blazers, who got a standout performance from goalie Dylan Ferguson but were also the recipients of good fortune on their second and third goals.
“Lately, the team effort in most games has been good, but we’re not getting the bounces to go our way,” said the 20-year-old Pawlenchuk.
“Their game winning goal in the last game deflects off the guy’s chest and goes in. Goals like that put us down and if a bounce like that went our way it would definitely help. But we just have to work through it and eventually it will turn around.”
Pawlenchuk, in his fifth and final season with the Rebels, is the team’s second-leading points producer with 39. He’s scored 15 goals and has a respectable shooting percentage of 11, but with a few breaks here and there he could easily have 20 goals and perhaps as many as 25.
In some ways, his season has mirrored that of the team.
“It’s the same for myself, I have 15 (goals) now but I definitely would have liked to had more at this point,” he said. “I’ve had some chances but I’m not getting the bounces, which would help the team out too. Hopefully we’ll start getting some bounces to go our way to help out the team.”
Not that he’s putting all of his shooting woes, and those of some of his veteran teammates, on bad luck.
“We have to be bearing down on our chances too, making sure they go in instead of looking for the bounces,” said Pawlenchuk, whose team will host the Medicine Hat Tigers Tuesday. “We’ll just keep working hard and keep going at it and see what we can do.”
Obviously, Pawlenchuk will play elsewhere next season and is confident he’ll see plenty of positive results when he follows the Rebels’ fortunes in future years.
That optimism is based on the fact the rebuilding club’s roster is top-heavy in first- and second-year players, most of whom look like they’ll be mainstays moving forward.
“There’s definitely a lot of skill with those players, but they are all still young so they need time,” said Pawlenchuk. “In the coming years they’re all going to develop and be top-notch players in this league.
“There’s definitely a big future here with the young guys we have now, the prospects we have and the high (bantam and import draft) picks we have coming up. It’s setting up to be a good team here the next few years.”
Notable: Rebels defenceman Alexander Alexeyev was driven to Calgary Monday by GM/head coach Brent Sutter and boarded a flight to Saint Petersburg, Russia, where his mother Julia passed away suddenly earlier in the day. “I told him not to return until he’s ready,” said Sutter, who like Alexeyev’s teammates and the entire team staff was naturally devastated by the news. Alexeyev, ranked 26th in the Central Scouting mid-term rankings of North American skaters eligible for this year’s NHL entry draft, was slated to play in the CHL/NHL Top Prospects Game Thursday in Guelph, Ont. . . . Rebels forward Kristian Reichel is ranked 80th by Central Scouting and defencemen Dawson Barteaux and Jacob Herauf are 156th and 203rd.
Scouting Report
Rebels vs. Medicine Hat Tigers, 7 p.m. Tuesday, Centrium
Medicine Hat is tied for fourth place in the Eastern Conference and sits first in the Central Division with a 24-18-5-0 record . . . LW Mark Rassell is the leading scorer for the Tigers, who are 4-3-3-0 in their last 10 games. Rassell has fired 39 goals and collected 59 points. D David Quenneville (19g,34a) is next with 53 points, while C James Hamblin (14-28-42), LW David Chyzowski (15-17-32) and C Gary Haden (12-19-31) round out the top team’s top five producers of offence . . . The Rebels and Tigers have met on three previous occasions this season, with Red Deer winning 4-1 Dec. 15 in Medicine Hat and the Tigers prevailing 5-2 Oct. 24 at the Centrium and 4-3 in overtime at home Dec. 30 . . . Jordan Hollett is 19th among all WHL goaltenders with a 3.40 goals-against average and 23rd with a save percentage of .897. He’s posted a win-loss record of 14-11-3. Teammate Michael Bullion is 21st among WHL stoppers with a 3.43 goals-against mark and 43rd in save percentage at .878 . . . Hollett was selected by the Ottawa Senators in the sixth round of last year’s NHL entry draft. Quenneville was picked by the New York Islanders in the seventh round in 2016, while D Linus Nassen and C Mason Shaw, currently out with injuries, were selected by Florida (third round) and Minnesota (fourth round) in the 2016 and 2017 drafts, respectively.
Injuries: Medicine Hat — C Mason Shaw (lower body, indefinite), LW Hayden Ostir (upper body, 5-7 weeks), D Linus Nassen (upper body, 3-5 weeks). Red Deer — None.
Special teams: Medicine Hat — Power play 22.1 per cent, 12th overall; penalty kill 76.1 per cent, 17th. Red Deer — Power play 17.2 per cent, 19th overall; penalty kill 74.5 per cent, 19th.
