Gelley, Smokies Camp, Tournament Schedule, KIJHL roster news

Here's a picture of Cole Gelley defending Graeme Strukoff last season at the Cominco Arena. Thanks to Randy Emery for that. As noted in Guy Bertrand's Trail Times article, Gelley and Strukoff were drafted one spot away from each other in the WHL Bantam draft several years back. Now they'll find themselves playing together. Here is the press release I wrote up for the Smokies website:

TRAIL, BC - Trail Smoke Eaters Coach and GM Jim Ingram announced today that the Smokies have acquired defenceman Cole Gelley and future considerations from the Surrey Eagles in exchange for defenceman Wade Bennett and forward Robert Lindores.

"Cole is a real good skating, puck moving defenceman that can quarterback a power play," said Ingram. "I think that's something we wanted to make sure we had (enough of) in the line-up."

Gelly, 19, recorded one goal, 19 assists (1-19-20) and 26 penalty minutes in 58 games with the Eagles last season. Gelley made his BCHL debut as an AP in 2007-08 and has played 101 career regular season games with the Eagles. Prior to that he played 75 games in Major Midget, recording 27 points (6-19-27) and 66 penalty minutes for the Vancouver North West Giants.

"It's a good opportunity and I'm excited to come up there," said Gelley. "I don't think my point totals really represent how much of an offensive player I am."

"I feel I have way more in the tank than that."

The move was partly necessitated by the number of returning 20 year old players on Trail's roster.

"There's no secret that we were top heavy with 1990 birth years," said Ingram.

This deal combined with the recent trade of Garrett Beckwith to Drumheller in the AJHL and the departure of Tom Rizzardo to Bizmark of the NAHL, trims Trail's number of 1990 born players from 10 to 7 before training camp. BCHL teams can only carry 6 of them once the puck drops for the regular season.

Bennett, 20, scored 3 goals and 19 assists (3-19-22) as a forward and defenceman with the Smoke Eaters last season. Lindores, 19, has scored 6 goals and 9 assists (6-9-15) over 89 career games with the Alberni Valley Bulldogs. He became Trail property as the future considerations in the Tye Lewis for Curtis Tonello trade.

As noted in the press release, the 20 year old log jam was reduced further as Tom Rizzardo has opted to play for Bizmark in the North American Hockey League. Tommy is a classy young man who has a lot of offensive talent. He proved that with Nelson during their KIJHL championship run in 2009. I hope he is able to translate that to the Junior A level with Bizmark.

That leaves Trail with seven 1990 born players in training camp. There's nothing wrong with a little healthy competition among veterans to make sure these guys aren't taking their spots for granted. We know camp is always competitive among rookies trying to make the club. This situation should make sure the vets are fighting for their jobs too.

The addition of Gelley ensures that barring any other moves the Smokies are going to have a veteran defensive unit this season. Gelley, Steve Koshey, Graeme Strukoff and Curtis Tonello are entering their third BCHL seasons while it will be the second for Eric Walker and Ben Matthews. There is room for one or two rookies to make the roster and learn with that group. However, that is a big step up from last September when the club was throwing 4 or 5 rookies over the boards every night. I'm sure goaltender Kiefer Smiley is thanking his lucky stars there will be some veteran help early on this year.

Training camp gets started on August 23rd with registration at 8:30am. The camp will run for three days and then the Smokies have a couple of exhibition games in Chase against Vernon.

TOURNAMENT SCHEDULE

The second annual Smokies pre-season tournament will run from Thursday, September 2nd to Saturday, September 4th. Here is the schedule:

Thursday, September 2nd
4:30pm Penticton vs Powell River
7:30pm Brooks vs Trail

Friday, September 3rd
4:30pm Brooks vs Penticton
7:30pm Powell River vs Trail

Saturday, September 4th
10:30am Powell River vs Brooks
1pm Penticton vs Trail

I'll do my best to get the arena as much as possible for the games. You can also likely count on some live coverage of the games on Ryan Pinder's Vees Blog. He did some live blogging from it lats year.

KIJHL ROSTER MOVES

A couple of moves in the KIJHL last week. First a trade that saw Grand Forks send PIM king Jacob Halderman to Columbia Valley for defencemen Zack MacLellan and Jordan Groenheyde. MacLellan was Columbia Valley's All-Star game rep. Both teams finished last in their division last season and are hoping for bounce back seasons. Can't hurt the Border Bruins to get a couple of young d-men with experience in the league. They finished well last year and I'm really hoping to see them continue to push forward. The community will really get behind them if they continue making progress. Check out the Off the Wahl blog for more.

New Nelson Leafs Coach and GM Chris Shaw announced this week that they've received a commitment from four of last year's veterans to return in September. F Gavin Currie, F Cody Abbey, D Tyler Parfeniuk and D Taylor O'Neil will all be back in Nelson. O'Neil and Currie both played as APs for Trail last season. Taylor is the Leafs Captain while Currie was their top forward in 2009-10. They should form a very strong core for Shaw to build around.

New Castlegar Coach and GM Steve Junker also announced that they'll be getting a couple of veteran talents back this season. Tough forward Taylor Anderson and top defenceman Darren Tarasoff have committed to return to the Rebels. Anderson was third in the KIJHL in penalty minutes while Tarasoff spent most of last season with Williams Lake in the BCHL. They should both be leaders on Junker's first squad.

Both the Leafs and Rebels will likely get more of last year's players back, but as with all KIJHL teams it is a waiting game until BCHL camps are complete. I've yet to hear much about who is or isn't expected back in Beaver Valley, but I do know they're excited about a lot of the young local talent that will be a part of their club this season.

Mountain FM is the official media partner of the KIJHL and we will continue to be the primary source for KIJHL coverage in the Kootenay-Boundary. If anything our coverage will expand and evolve this season. I'm looking forward to it.

More to come on the blog this week including and interview with former Smokies Coach Tim Kehler on taking over the Salmon Arm Silverbacks this season.

Smokies trade Bennett and Lindores for Gelley

Breaking news this afternoon that the Smoke Eaters have traded 1990 born defenceman/forward Wade Bennett and 1991 born forward Robert Lindores to Surrey for 1991 born defenceman Cole Gelley.

This is another move to help clear the log jam of 1990s on Trail's roster. I'm glad to see someone as classy and hard working as Bennett will stay in the BCHL and have a real opportunity to show what he is capable of doing at this level. It is also a good more for Lindores as he has a connection to the Eagles organization. Lindores was the future considerations in the Tye Lewis deal from Alberni Valley and never played a game as a Smoke Eater.

Gelley is a good skater who has the potential to be an offensive catalyst and power play quarterback from the blue line. In Surrey he went from having 6 points as a rookie to 20 points last season with limited ice in offensive situations. He is a guy that the Smoke Eaters feel will come in and challenge for top minutes on the man advantage.

I'll have more this weekend on Gelley and his background with the Eagles and the Major Midget Vancouver Northwest Giants. Tune in to Mountain FM's Overtime tonight for interviews with Gelley and Smokies Coach Jim Ingram.

Thursday Notes (Brown, Lindores, Marketing)

A couple pieces of Smokies news to report today. First of all I'm disappointed to report that Justin Brown will be leaving the Smoke Eaters to start his education at UBC. I'm not disappointed in Justin or anything, just disappointed that we won't get to see him fully achieve his potential as a BCHL player. However, it is easy to understand his decision.

Anyone who knows Justin knows that he's an extremely sharp guy with a great future ahead of him. As much as hockey is a passion at some point we all have to set our priorities. For someone who is that good of a student it's hard to just sit back for 3 full years after graduation. On top of that Justin has been cursed by one injury after another during his 2 seasons of BCHL hockey. That includes a lingering concussion at the end of this season. I can totally understand his desire to start the next stage of his life.

Just like it was with CJ Legassic last year this is an amicable departure. Both guys are all class and simply doing what they felt was best for their future.

You can tell from the interview I did with Justin that it was a really tough decision. He specifically notes how well everyone in the room gets along and the potential for the Smokies to be very competitive in the Interior this season. I know it'll be tough for Brown to not be a part of that.

As for that potential I mentioned you only have to look to one point at the end of the season when Brown put up 8 points over 7 games. He was always a guy Coach Ingram looked to for leadership, hard work and two-way play. Brown never ran from that role... he embraced it. However, in that stretch Justin proved he could bring an impressive offensive game to the table as well. If he came back and was able to stay healthy there's no reason to think he couldn't be a consistent scoring threat.

Unfortunately this is the end of the road for Brown as an active member of the Smokies roster. As he says in his interview he has many fond memories from that time and will always be proud of wearing a letter with his home town team. I hope once he settles in at UBC we may see him again one day lacing up the skates for the Thunderbirds. Either way the bottom line is that he's going to be a success at whatever it is he does and the whole organization wishes him well.

Here's the interview...

Justin Brown on Mountain FM's Overtime

Click here to download

LINDORES TO TRAIL

One of the seemingly worst kept secrets around these parts has now officially come to light. I knew for a while that Robert Lindores was the "future considerations" in the Tye Lewis for Curtis Tonello deal between Trail and Alberni Valley. I didn't tell anyone but somehow it seems like a number of fans knew about it. Despite that, these things can often take a while to become official at the end of a BCHL season.

We haven't heard anything officially from the Smokies on the matter, but the Bulldogs put out a press release announcing the completion of the deal. I haven't talked to Robert so I don't have a tremendous amount to add to that. I will say that this is a player that I believe has more to offer than what we've seen from him in the BCHL so far. In his two seasons he has primarily been a third/fourth line guy who brings a physical and gritty game to his team. I've also heard that Lindores has a heck of a shot that he could use to become more of a goal scorer if given the opportunity.

The 6'1, 198lbs Port Alberni native will have to leave his home club after two seasons. That's not always a bad thing. There can be some pressures, spotlight and expectations that comes with playing in front of friends and family. Perhaps this will be the chance he needs to "bloom" as a player at this level. I think most would agree the potential is there. He only has 15 career BCHL points, but Lindores was a scorer in Major Midget. He was the top goal scorer and point getter on the North Island Silvertips (13-17-30 in 37 games) during the 2007-08 season. This is a guy who can bring more offence to the table if he's given the opportunity.

In the end you have to like the Lewis deal from Trail's perspective. Tye is a very talented player, but things just weren't working for the Smokies at the time of the trade. It made sense for them to move a couple of their vets to try and get a couple of assets for this season. Tonello made an immediate impact as a calming influence on the back end with untapped offensive ability. He'll be a huge player for Trail this year.

Lindores could easily do the same type of thing as a physical force up front with untapped offensive pressure. Both guys are the types of players who will help a deep roster of returning players compete harder in close games.

Meanwhile, Lewis helped push the Bulldogs to top spot in the Coast during the regular season and a great series against the Kings in the conference finals. It was a deal that appears to have worked for both sides.

ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING

I won't get into details of the AGM too much on here. We talked about it a bunch on Overtime as it is. I did want to mention though that one thing that was apparent from the meeting is that we need to get more people into the building next year. Trail's core fans are as dedicated and reliable as any... there just aren't quite enough of them.

Trail's average attendance of 912 people basically tied them with Prince George for 5th in the Interior and 11th in the BCHL. That's not actively bad or anything, but it's not good enough. The Smokies face additional travel expenses thanks to our location here all by ourselves without a BCHL neighbour. If this team is going to go toe to toe with teams in the Okanagan the attendance has to be in the same league as those teams. There is no reason a city full of passionate hockey fans can't at least equal the 1047 fans they average in West Kelowna or the 1008 they average in Salmon Arm.

So how do we do that? I've taken on some additional responsibility with the club this year as the Marketing Director. That means I'll be working on corporate sponsorship and developing some marketing strategies for the club during the off season. That in addition with my full time gig at Mountain FM makes me a pretty busy man.

In this new role I'm constantly talking to different people brainstorming ideas to get the community more excited about the hockey club. The easy answer for better attendance is a winning product. I believe we'll have that this year. That being said, we can't count on that to change things alone. We're going to be doing some new things to especially try and bring more kids and young families to the rink.

Any ideas? I hope I have some, but I clearly don't have all the answers. If anyone out there has some suggestions for what they think we should do to fill those orange seats at the Cominco Arena feel free to let me know. I should note though that many of these ideas require more "people power" than we have so as much as I'd appreciate ideas I'd also love to see more people volunteer their time. That's what makes this team tick.

Also, if you're thinking about getting involved with the club as a corporate sponsor you can get that information by clicking here.

Plus you can support the Smokies by coming out to this year's Alumni Golf Tournament and Banquet. Details are available on the official website.

As is our new videos page.

While I'm busy linking to things I might as well also note that there's a ton of BCHL news up on the league website right now. New hires, contract extensions, promotions, scholarships, etc. Just enough to wet the hockey fan appetite for a while here in the off season.

OK that'll do it for today. Go Lakers!