San Diego. Not just the last name of one of the world's most elusive criminal masterminds, but also an actual geographical location. "America's Finest City" as it is often never referred to as. With its balmy weather and beautiful beaches, the famous San Diego Zoo and more, San Diego is a wonderful place to live and visit.
Personally, though, when I think of San Diego the first that pops into my head is hockey. I mean, how couldn't you. So many famous hockey players spring to mind. Take, for example,....Thatcher Demko. He's a person that plays hockey who happens to be from San Diego that I totally didn't have to Google to find out about. He's not even completely random, you might have even heard of him before. And Chad Ruhwedel I guess.
I bet both of those guys were just hanging out on the beach one day when they both had thoughts like "all of this sun and sand really makes me want to have a career full of frozen rubber and ice". It totally checks out.

If you're not buying that, then perhaps t's the lengthy history that San Diego has with hockey. And while I fully intended for that to be a satirical line, it turns out that it's partially true. Hockey in San Diego has been played as early on as the 1940s. The San Diego Boat Club existed for all of one season before giving way to the Skyhawks (not to be confused with Landhawks?). Fast forwards 60 years and you've got more recent teams like the Surf and Sabres, as well as current AHL team the Gulls and the SDSU Aztecs.

Perhaps more importantly though, you have the San Diego Tidal. The SMJHL expansion team whose existence began for the start of S76 (along with the Ottawa Highlanders). The feature of this article. While most teams will opt for an animal, weapon or other vicious symbol to strike fear into their opposition, San Diego decided to forego all of that and be water. Terrifying. So long as everyone else in the league is a wicked witch or small fire.



Expansion teams historically don't fare well in the early going, but in recent years we've seen that it isn't always ripe for hope and despair. So who have Corey Kennedy and the rest of team management decided to bring in for the Tidal's inaugural season? Have they decided to bring in some homegrown talent to help bring in more fans and sell the game? How many San Diegans will populte the roster. Well....

Marko Kivimäki
Born: Helsinki, Finland
Distance from San Diego: 5,667.84 mi

Gina Pinard
Born: Unknown, Finland
Distance from San Diego: unknown

Skyler Stevens
Born: Toronto, Canada
Distance from San Diego: 2,164.13 mi

Sam Volta
Born: Montreal, Canada
Distance from San Diego: 2,908.0 mi

Caper Poirot
Born: Alert, Nunavut, Canada
Distance from San Diego: 3,673 mi

Josh Grygo
Born: Chicago, IL, USA
Distance from San Diego: 2,077.71 mi

Klims Jevsejevs
Born: Daugavpils, Latvia
Distance from San Diego: 5,949 mi

Daquavion Davis II
Born: Greensboro, NC, USA
Distance from San Diego: 2,471 mi

Mathias Olivera
Born: Montevideo, Uruguay
Distance from San Diego: 6,114.66 mi

Jurijs Rālfs
Born: Liepāja, Latvia
Distance from San Diego: 5,798 mi

Silas Bart
Born: Vernon, Canada
Distance from San Diego: 1,505.5 mi

Journey Man
Born: N/A
Distance from San Diego: N/A

Æric Calland
Born: Bergen, Norway
Distance from San Diego: 5,229 mi

Max Hammer
Born: Salzburg, Germany
Distance from San Diego: 6,074 mi

Meo Vanbiesbrouck
Born: Embarrass, USA
Distance from San Diego: 2,095.8 mi

Brandon Gilleyes
Born: Nuuk, Greenland
Distance from San Diego: 3,472 mi

Sergey Ivanov
Born: Yelizovo, Russia
Distance from San Diego: 4,227 mi

Future Considerations
Born: Geneva, Switzerland
Distance from San Diego: 5,939.34 mi

---

What have we learned after preforming this exercise? Absolutely nothing. We don't have a single Californian on the roster, let alone a native San Diegan. The closest player isn't even an American, but hopefully Silas Bart can implore his fellow Vernonites to visit and fill the San Diego Sports Arena. 
The important thing is that no matter where they're from be it Latvia, Greenland, Germany or anywhere else in the world, they've now found themselves a home in San Diego and will forever be etched into Tidal history. This is the next wave of San Diego hockey. Get it? 

Surf's up!

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Word count: 950

Matviy Cajabi || RW || SMJHL - Anchorage Armada (22nd overall, S75)
                                          SHL -  Edmonton Blizzard (13th overall, S76) 
Age: 20
Birthplace: Kramatorsk, Ukraine
Height: 6'1"
Weight: 200 lbs
Number: 9 ------------------------------------------------------------
Career Statistics:
SMJHL Regular Season:
S75 Armada | 66 GP | 15 G | 34 A | 49 P | +17 |   2 PPP | 20 PIM | 119 H
S76 Armada | 66 GP | 14 G | 23 A | 37 P |  -21 | 14 PPP | 25 PIM |   94 H
S77 Timber  | 66 GP | 43 G | 50 A | 93 P | +46 | 19 PPP | 46 PIM | 143 H 
S78  Timber 

I think there's only a single player from San Diego in the league, but Alexa is captain of the Saint Louis Scarecrows, no way they were getting her.

Alexa Johansen | LW | St. Louis Scarecrows | USA | Season 75 - | 450 TPE

Height: 5'10"

Weight: 176 lbs

Number: 16

-------------

(S75) J Draft- 2nd OA, St. Louis Scarecrows

(S76) SHL Draft- 2nd OA, Edmonton Blizzard

-------------

Career Highlights

SEA|TEAM|GP|G|A|PTS|S%|+/-|HITS|PiM|

S75|STL|66|13|22|35|9.7%|-61|78|31|

S76|STL|66|20|38|58|11.8%|-38|117|38|

S77|STL|66|30|36|66|15.5%|-15|93|54|

My kind of article. I like it!