Wolves Young Talent Aided By Experienced Veterans
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With an average age of 24.3, the Chicago Wolves have one of the youngest rosters in the AHL this season, but that doesn’t mean they have a shortage of experience when it comes to winning championships.
Collectively, the Wolves roster boasts five NCAA conference championships, five Western Hockey League (WHL) championships, two Deutsche Eishockey Liga (DEL) championships, two Memorial Cups, two Ontario Hockey League (OHL) championships, one NCAA Frozen Four title, and one United States Hockey League (USHL) Clark Cup championship. There are also two World Juniors silver medals, and one Olympic silver medal.
And, of course, two players already have Calder Cups to their names as well.
Forward Brooks Macek, who won two DEL championships with EHC München and recorded two goals and two assists en route to helping Germany capture Olympic silver in 2018, leans on the confidence learned from those experiences as he prepares for the Calder Cup Final.
“You just gotta make sure that everybody's got the confidence that you know you're a great team, that you can win,” Macek said. “We made it to the finals. I think that's a pretty big part of having team confidence, and especially in the last three games against San Diego, I think we did a great job showing that. Getting three wins in a row against a really good team, it says a lot.”
Forwards T.J. Tynan and Curtis McKenzie both have Calder Cups on their resume; Tynan won in 2016 with the Lake Erie Monsters and McKenzie won in 2014 with the Texas Stars. McKenzie also made a trip to the Final last season with Texas, where they were defeated by the Toronto Marlies.
Both Tynan and McKenzie won their Calder Cups early in their professional careers. McKenzie won in his first season as a pro, a year in which he was also named AHL Rookie of the Year, leading the league during the regular season in points and assists by a first-year player. Tynan was in his second full year, then a part of the Columbus Blue Jackets system.
In hockey, much is said about players winning championships early in their careers. Perhaps a player doesn’t appreciate how hard the journey was when they win so early, or they expect to be back in the finals every season. Tynan and McKenzie both look back with fondness on those early wins and emphasized the bonding experience that a long playoff run creates.
“You win, you have that memory with all those guys, a lot of which are my great friends to this day,” Tynan said of his Cup-winning season. “Having those memories, I think it motivates you because you want to create that memory and that legacy with the next group of guys you're with.”
McKenzie echoed that thought, saying: “[Winning the Cup] was so much fun. I'm still great buddies with a lot of guys from that team. So the memories are great. They're so cool, looking back on [the memories].”
The idea of being able to have that same sort of bond with this season’s Wolves team is a huge motivator for the team. “This group, it's a lot of fun,” Tynan said. “It's been an awesome year, and to have [a Cup win] keep us together, bond us forever, would be pretty cool.”
For McKenzie, back-to-back seasons of appearances in the Calder Cup Finals has provided a chance to reflect on just how many things have to go right for a team to advance this far. “I think it's more just looking around the league and looking at other friends and guys you respect who are great players that never get an opportunity to get to this stage,” McKenzie said. “You’ve got to take advantage of it. That's what we're trying to tell the the young guys here. You never really know when your chance will be to win again.”
The vast majority of the Wolves’ roster has less than 20 appearances in the Calder Cup playoffs. McKenzie leads the way with 69 playoff games. For most players, however, this is their first extended playoff run.
“I've been fortunate to be in situations before that I can reflect on and try and share my experiences with them,” McKenzie said, when asked what it’s been like for him as an experienced veteran on a team full of players who have never been this deep in the playoffs before. “[I’m] just trying to share different things that I've seen in the past, both winning and coming close last year.”
Defenseman Griffin Reinhart, who has one Memorial Cup and two WHL Championships from his time with the Edmonton Oil Kings, has been impressed with the young players on the team. “I've been pretty pleased with their play, especially with how many young guys we have, to get to the Finals.”
For Reinhart, integrating so many new faces into the roster — particularly as the team dealt with injuries, trades, and call-ups — hasn’t been a challenge. “I think it was one of our biggest strengths on this team. No matter who goes down, we got guys who come up and we have a good system in place,” Reinhart said. “Look at game four, I believe, with Grand Rapids, playing there on the road with six or seven guys injured, able to come out and get that win.”
First year players like Cody Glass, Zach Whitecloud (each with 12 points in 17 games), and Nic Hague (9 points in 17 games) are getting their first taste of exposure on the national stage as professionals. When people talk about the future of the Wolves — and of their parent affiliate, the NHL’s Vegas Golden Knights — they talk about players like Glass, Whitecloud, and Hague. But the leadership borne out of experience from players who have won it all — whether it’s the Calder Cup or a Memorial Cup — has provided a model of success for the Wolves’ youth movement.
