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(Graded) Deep Dive #1 - The missfortunes of the S25 expansion brothers
#1
(This post was last modified: 08-11-2021, 01:39 PM by Opera_Phantom.)

Colorado Raptors, previously also knows as the Colorado Mammoth, are a team from SMJHL currently playing their 35th season in the league, being part of the S25 expansion that brought not only their SMJHL counterparts Halifax Raiders (currently Maine Timber), but also 2 SHL teams, the Buffalo Stampede, and the Portland Admirals (currently the San Francisco Pride). The reason why I am writing this article? Currently, Colorado holds the longest streak without winning the 4 star cup in the SMJHL. By 3 seasons. The 2nd worst team? Their expansion brothers, the Timber. What in the world happened?

So, if you look at the current streaks of not winning the cup, SMJHL proves to be fantastically close to each other. All but 4 teams have won a cup in the S50s, with the exceptions being Nevada (established in S55, never won), St. Louis (last won in S46, “only“ 14 seasons ago), and then come Maine and Colorado. The last cup Maine won was the S30 one, double the streak that St. Louis has, and Colorado hasn’t won one since the S27. Even the finals appearances aren’t very numerous. Maine has, since their last cup, seen the finals twice, in S36 and then again only in S55. Colorado fared a touch better, since their cup in S27 they have been to finals 3 times, in S35, S44 and S50.

As for the reasons? Well, that’s awfully hard to say. The SMJHL teams shouldn’t have the option to blame bad expansion drafts for the lack of success, since it wouldn’t influence them too much and considering that both teams won a cup within 3 seasons of expansion doesn’t give this claim much power. A GM carousel, you say? Too often changing your front office is not good for the team’s performance? That’s not exactly true. In Js, changing your GM is a relatively common experience and event he more successful teams have a lot of names in their GM lists, with not a lot of GMs having super long tenures with the exception of people like TML (who GMed the team for 25 seasons). Maine and Colorado don’t really fall out of the ordinary when it comes to the number of GMs they had, even compared to some of the best and most successful franchises that SMJHL has to offer.

As for any other reasons, like the quality of GMs, or the draft successes, or FA or anything like that, that is very hard to even get to judge, let alone judge, after all these seasons. I guess it all boils down to a single point – some teams, even in a league as close as this, are just destined to be last. Because someone has to be. The S25 expansion has it’s reputation to not have been a great expansion in general, even the SHL teams have had horrible starts and even worse histories (until Buffalo decided to be good), and the fortunes of these two teams haven’t really helped that at all. The only thing that these two franchises can do is keep trying and hoping that someday, sometime, the smile of the fake hockey gods shines upon them once more.

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#2

Sadge.

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#3

Approved!

+5 TPE @Citizen of Adraa
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