Image Credit: Canadian Hockey League

By Adam Donnelly

KAMLOOPS BLAZERS

Blazers’ bench boss and GM looks back at the season that was, ahead to new chapter

Jun 8, 2023 | 4:13 PM

KAMLOOPS — It was a thoughtful Shaun Clouston who met with the media shortly after the Blazers were knocked out of the Memorial Cup.

After a pressure-filled season, the Blazers’ head coach and general manager seemed at ease with how it had all played out.

“From a coaching standpoint, the mindset is you get up in the morning and you work,” Clouston explained. “You assess things, you have leadership meetings, you have one-on-one meetings, you have meetings with the staff, you put a practice plan together, you get the video ready. You have a vision of how you want the team to play and you just work at it — you work at it and you work at it, and if you do that you can feel satisfied. Peace of mind at the end of the day.”

As Memorial Cup hosts, the Blazers knew that pressure was going to be there all year. Clouston and the rest of the hockey operations staff made some moves early in the season to address areas on the roster that they felt needed improvement.

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“You have to go after it when you’re hosting,” Clouston says. “We believed we needed to be a little bit harder. We had a good skill element. We had to address that early on, we had to be a little bit bigger and harder, so you do the absolute best you can. Who’s available and who’s not available? What do we have to pay? What do we have for assets? We’ve got to really go after this.”

The additions of Shea Van Olm, Ashton Ferster and Jakub Demek addressed that need for size and toughness.

However, as the season progressed, it became clear that the Blazers would have to make a splash ahead of the trade deadline in order to keep pace with Seattle. Clouston sent four players and 10 draft picks to the Everett Silvertips for 20-year-old Ryan Hofer and reigning CHL defenseman of the year Olen Zellweger.

“I think the organization feels really good about making a decision or accepting the fact that we were going to have to make some big moves and spend what people are going to consider as too much,” Clouston says. “But we went after it. We went for it.”

When you look at the names of the players who likely won’t be back next season, it’s a who’s who of the Blazers’ top players. Zellweger, Stankoven, Bankier, Seminoff, Demek and Masters are all eligible to return for their 20-year-old seasons but have signed NHL contracts. That means there will likely be opportunities for younger players to crack the Blazers roster.

“The hockey world is expecting us to kind of fall off the map,” Clouston says. “We have the mindset we’re just not going to do that. We had a whole bunch of young players who were able to go through this experience with us, to practice with us. I think they learned a lot. Who’s the next guy up? I think every year, there are guys who surprise people, who come in and are able to come in and take on bigger roles. We just want to keep going.”