PR - Wheat Kings

The TFHL17 WHEAT KINGS

Head Coach: Tyler Young
Associate Coaches: Brent Sutter, Don Hay

Captain: Josh Hennessy
Assistants: Mark Stuart, Sergei Zubov

After an unexpectedly busy off-season, the Wheat Kings are hoping that their revamped defence, deeper offence and a veteran tandem in net will allow them to regain at least some of their tarnished glory.

"Our objectives are quite simple," Coach-GM Tyler Young said, "first, seriously compete for a top four finish in our conference, and second, win a playoff series. To meet the first goal I think we need to score about fifteen more goals this year than last, so break three hundred, and at the same time shave about fifteen from the goals against, so get back down to around two-fifty. I think we've done the changes needed to meet that primary objective, as for the second, we'll see but I think we can do it."

"We still have a relatively young team, especially up front, so we just need to set achievable goals and try to meet them - as long as we continue to improve, we'll be ok. Last year we took a serious step backwards and ultimately resulted in the purging of so-many former elements of our core group."


FORWARDS

The Wheat Kings go into TFHL17 with their deepest nine-man unit since their President Trophy Championship of TFHL14. Unlike that group, this corp is young (ranging in age from 18 to 22) and still has some room to develop.

Dimitri Kazionov, now the bonfide goal-scoring king of the TFHL, joins Steve Bernier and newly minted captain Josh Hennessy to give the Wheat Kings a powerful triumvirate. First rounders Peter Mueller, Mike Frolik and Nik Bergfors will round-out the top two lines. Bergfors found chemistry with Bernier two years ago and it's hoped, with the rambunctious and slick Frolik riding shot-gun, that Bergfors and Bernier will click again and provide the Kings' (finally) with a true secondary threat. Mueller is the highest player the Kings' have ever drafted since the elder days of HS2 with Simon Gamache, the man who would have been king (sigh...).

The third line is expected to provide a tertiary offensive weapon while also being solid checkers. Matty Ritola and Byron Bitz will get full-time jobs this year, after they impressively finished the final quarter of last season at nearly a point-per-game. Eric Fehr will join them and hopefully follow-up last year's break-out 29 goal season with a similar showing. Brian Rolston, Brad Larsen, and Rico Fata all provide depth in case of injury and are solid penalty-killers.


DEFENCE

For the first time in their history the Wheat Kings fell out of the top third in shots against per game and were in the bottom half in goals against last year. The Kings under Mike Keenan always prided themselves on their defensive awareness, an aptitude which allowed them to often make up for some occasional offensive short-comings, but not last year. This year the Kings have made efforts to increase their depth and round-out the group.

In order to correct last season's fiascal, the Kings went in the opposite direction: instead of young, slick, soft d-men, the Kings brought in a group of knarled, tough, veteran monsters. Very little remains from that group: Mark Stuart, who was the one bright light last year, returns. Joel Kwiatkowski was part of a package which saw the talented but mercurial Duncan Keith go to the Aces. Sergei Zubov and Karol Rachunek were picked-up for prospects and Jason Smith was signed through free agency. Cam Barker will be the lone rookie in the group and, in a radical difference from the forward core, the only player besides Mark Stuart under the age of 28. The only other returnees are Mike Rathje and Slava Suchy, who played last season as the team's #3 and #5 d-man but are now sitting seventh and eight on the depth chart.

If this corp has a serious weakness, it's the lack of a truly elite d-man. With Stuart, Smith, Kwiatkowski and Zubov, the Kings instead have a group of four who would be solid 2/3s on most teams.


GOALTENDING

After deciding that rookie g-man Jimmy Howard would be better served by another full-year on the farm, the Wheat Kings added a pair of solid veteran goaltenders in separate deals. Tomas Vokoun was acquired from the Misconduct and Byron Dafoe added from the Blades.

Vokoun played last year briefly with the Kings, but had good numbers playing the majority of it on the Misconducts, finishing the season in the league leaders and he also had a good playoffs. Dafoe took the Blades to the top of the Western Conference in the first half of last year until the team cool-down and Roberto Luongo was brought in, relegating Dafoe to a back-up role.