Brooks Bandits With new head coach and general manager Brian Curran at the helm, the Brooks Bandits are making the most of their final season at the Lakeside Leisure Centre. Led by sniper Jarret Granberg, who has netted 21 goals and 39 points in 31 games this season, the Bandits have risen to the top of the AJHL’s South Division with a 19-10-2-0 record, one point better than the Okotoks Oilers. The former NHLer dealt away the rights to Matt Hallick and Eric Toews to the Fort McMurray Oil Barons in favour of Matt Williams and Andy Williams. Calgary Canucks The South Division leaders for much of the two months of the AJHL season have fallen on hard times recently, sliding from first to a tie for fourth with the Drumheller Dragons thanks to a dismal 1-6-0-3 record in their last 10 games. “We really started not playing well when Matt (Mackay) went to play at the World Junior A Challenge, letting in a few bad goals and then we added to that with some injuries,” said head coach and general manager Don Phelps. “We got some great goaltending at the start of the year and it hasn’t been quite as good lately, but we’re a better team than we’ve shown the last five or six games.” Calgary Royals By all accounts, it has been a dismal start to the 2008/09 campaign for the ever-struggling Calgary Royals. Despite bringing in a proven winner in head coach Scott Welsh, who helped make the Mount Royal College Cougars a perennial contender in the Alberta college ranks, the Royals have struggled mightily this season, posting a 4-20-0-2 record so far to put them at them in a tie with the Drayton Valley Thunder for worst in the AJHL with 10 points. Canmore Eagles The long shadow cast by former head coach and general manager Bob Miller is gone, yet it has hardly been all sunshine in the Rockies so far this year. In his first full-season holding Miller’s old roles, Andrew Milne has ushered in a youth movement in Canmore and the results have been mixed. Building with 14 rookies, the Eagles sat sixth in the AJHL’s South Division at press time with a 9-14-0-2 record. Not exactly all roses, but the Eagles have been without two of its leaders in Kaare Odegard and captain David Fitzpatrick for a dozen games apiece so far this year, yet have still managed to rattle off a 6-3-1-0 record in its last 10 games. “We’re in the first year of a three-year program, so we are looking at development as our biggest thing right now,” said Milne. Camrose Kodiaks True to his word, Boris Rybalka’s Camrose Kodiaks have shaken off their early season case of the doldrums and emerged once more as a competitive team in the AJHL’s South Division. Decimated by success, the Kodiaks lost the core of the national silver medalist squad from 2007/08 including Joe Colborne, a first-round pick of the Boston Bruins last June. Still, before the year began Rybalka promised his team wouldn’t concern itself with the win-loss column in the early going, instead working on team dynamics and systems. The results, he said, would take care of themselves. The Kodiaks are slowly creeping up the standings, closing the gap on the fourth place Canucks and Grizzlys thanks to a 6-3-0-1 run in their last 10 games. Drumheller Dragons The scoring well has run dry for the Dragons recently and the once mighty boys from the Badlands have started to show weakness in the Alberta Junior Hockey League’s South Division thanks to a 2-8-0-0 stretch in their last 10 games. “It has been frustrating for the players as well as the staff because we are used to scoring a lot and recently we haven’t been able to get anything in the back of the net,” admitted Dragons head coach Rob Hegberg. “At the same time it seems that every mistake we make ends up in the back of our net.” The Dragons pulled the trigger on a three-team deal with the Penticton Vees and Cowichan Capitals in November, dealing away unhappy forward Erik Slemp in favour of defenceman Nathan Westover. Olds Grizzlys Injury-riddled and filled with rookies, the Olds Grizzlys have managed to find a way to hang out amongst the leaders in the AJHL’s South Division so far this year. Despite the loss of veterans Shadoe Stoodley and last year’s league rookie of the year Wade Bergman to injury and of defenceman Max Ross to the WHL’s Lethbridge Hurricanes, the Grizzlys have maintained a level of consistency this entire campaign. As a reward they’ve picked up 30 points and remain only a point back of home-ice advantage come playoff time, which is exactly where they hope to be come February. Okotoks Oilers Perhaps one of the biggest surprises in the entire AJHL this season rests in the Calgary bedroom community of Okotoks. Having lost more than a dozen players to scholarship or graduation, the Oilers were by all accounts starting from scratch in 2008/09. Still, the short tradition of excellence head coach and general manager Dan MacDonald and director of player personnel Garry VanHereweghe have established seems to have worn off on the new Oilers class. Led by rookie scoring sensations Corban Knight, Kyle Reynolds and John McInnis, the Oilers have stormed the South Division, posting a 19-11-1-0 record this season to sit second. It would seem this crew is looking to answer some questions raised after an early exit from last year’s playoffs.
