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ontanis · 08-06-2019, 07:43 AM

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4083 words.

- The Parade -

The atmosphere in downtown Vancouver on the bright, cloudless Monday was electric. Hundreds and thousands of hockey fans lined the sidewalks along the parade route and hung from the open windows of office buildings to cheer their heroes.

Eager to return the affection, players and team staff smiled and waved as the seemingly endless procession of vehicles crept along Vancouver's Main Street. Sensing an opportunity to get up close and personal Mikas Bieksa, Artem Mozgov, and Jon Forty-One hopped from their cars to exchange greetings, handshakes, and high-fives with the adoring masses of fans.

There was plenty of reason to celebrate. Following a five-season wait, the Four-Star Cup had, at long last, returned to the Vancity. A week earlier, on the evening of July 25, 2019, the underdog Vancouver Whalers had toppled SMJHL’s reigning powerhouse team, the Anaheim Outlaws, in a thrilling 7-game finals series.

The Vancouver Whalers triumph signaled a changing of the SMJHL old guard. Out with the old, in with the new. Indeed, boasting a dynamic young core of Aaron Wilson, Bobby “Bob” Bobcalf, Dale “Whale” Miller, and the stoic goalie Kasperi “The Braulin Wall” Braulin, the Whalers looked every bit a sure-fire dynasty in the making, although it was not meant to be with the players mentioned earlier. These guys were locked in for success in the big leagues - SHL. A number of players were ready to step in their shoes: Artem Mozgov, Mikas Bieksa, Jan Zacha, Jon Forty-One, Jean-Paul Boivin amongst others. These names were on the lips of every Vancouver Whalers fans when talking about the future success of the team.

Even veteran hockey people thought so. “This team is set up for a great future,” said Arnost Holub, the Vancouver Whalers GM, “These guys are all in their early professional careers.” Senior advisor to the Vancouver Whalers GM, Teddy Phelps, who’d backstopped two Four-Star Cup winners in Vancouver in back-to-back seasons 35 and 36, agreed. “We could have a winner dynasty for the next two or three seasons,” he said.

- The long way to the top -

But the ride to the top of the SMJHL world was anything but smooth.

Following a mid-table finish in the S48 SMJHL Regular Season, the team had gotten off to a blazing start in Season 48 SMJHL Playoffs. Powered by a hat-trick from the towheaded Bobby Bobcalf, the Whalers started off three-game winning streak with an impressive 6–1 victory over Montreal Militia to begin the playoffs.

The instant the team reached three wins against none, it all came crashing down. After three commanding wins against Montreal, the Vancouver Whalers began to inexplicably choke. A 3-1, 6-3 and 5-4 losses to the Militia started to topple the Whalers calm and poised exterior - the Whalers began to struggle. But alas, after bobbing along like a cork in the middle of the sea in Games 4, 5 and 6, the green and blue dropped four goals in a row without reply from the Militia in Game 7 and the coast was clear - the Whalers were once again onwards to the Conference Finals.

What came next was a truly championship worthy performance: after dropping Game 1 against the Anchorage Armada 5-1, the Whalers seemed to turn on a switch. Like a vehicle, put into overdrive, the Vancouver Whalers seemed to start clicking, Game 2 saw the Whalers forward trio carry the game 3-1 with goals from Aaron Wilson, Theo Morgan and Bobby Bobcalf. A very tight Game 3 was an intense battle in which Jon Forty-One looked like a man on a mission, scoring 2 goals in quick succession to take the game 3-2. Games 4 and 5 looked like the battle of Gravelines, where the mighty Armada were sunk mercilessly by results 6-1 and 7-2. The Whalers were looking like a mighty mythological beast which no one could catch and hunt down.

But there is always a twist…

- The Finals -

For the first time since forever the Vancouver Whalers GM Arnost Holub seemed at a loss. He shuffled line combinations at a frenetic pace in hopes of striking a winning formula, with little effect. The Anaheim Outlaws took the Game 1 of the Four-Star Cup Finals 3-2 in an overtime win. The Outlaws’ mighty goalie Tibuk Soonika was looking impenetrable, saving 27 shots. The Outlaws fans were deafeningly loud and that took effect on the Whalers. The players were lost. They were dejected. They were generating chances but without any conceivable result. And you could see the soul leave the Whalers after the overtime goal was scored.

Game 2 in Anaheim came. And the slide continued. The Whalers lost again in the same fashion, by the same score, even: 3-2. Nobody was happy - not management, not the fans, and not the players. Certainly not Aaron Wilson. The SMJHL superstar walked around the arena and the locker room with a cap pulled down near his eyes. Inside the locker room, you could cut the tension with a knife. “Guys just weren’t having fun,” Bieksa recalled. “It was like no one wanted to come to the rink.”

Even though you could see the weight of the world falling upon the shoulders of captain Aaron Wilson, he remained as calm as ever, “I think we have to take with us that we played in our last game the best game. Even the first game we had more quality chances. We all make mistakes. Sometimes it costs us goals. But as a team, we're confident. We'll stick together. We have to win two at home to even the series.”

Whalers GM Holub sat squarely atop the hot seat. Needless to say, Holub wasn’t afraid to ruffle feathers… Or turn up the heat. Displeased with his team’s sorry showing, Holub burned the whole team after the second game behind the closed locker room doors and ripped into his players. He lit into the team following a lackluster 3–2 loss to Outlaws. “It’s a pathetic performance,” Holub fumed. “Half of the team doesn’t care. That defensive squad - I am really starting to believe their goal is to be the worst defensive squad in the finals history… They turn the puck over. They have no vision. They are soft. I have never seen a bunch of defensemen as soft as this.”

Whalers’ CO-GM Barrett McCarthy also had something to say “We're down 2‑0. We're all lacking sleep. This is tough. I didn't expect my players today to be cheery and upbeat. We're in the Four-Star Cup Final and we're down 2‑0. You don't get a lot of these opportunities. Excuse us if today we're not real cheery. But next game, I can tell you we're going to show up.”

His players got the message. They began to compete - and improve, almost instantly and overnight. Through equal parts discipline, instruction, and grinding repetition, the detail-oriented managers Arnost Holub and Barrett McCarthy had helped drag the Whalers from the mire of the first two games and set them on a winning course. “When you’re two games down in the most important showing of the whole series, there is a reason,” he explained. “And if you want to have some success, we have to change everything - the attitude, work ethic and commitment - because we are going the wrong way. Pretty simple.”

Needless to say, the Whalers looked like a different team on the ice. In Games 3 and 4, Vancouver Whalers scored 10 goals: 5-2 and 5-1. The Whalers were looking as commanding as ever. Even their free-agent rookie Mikas Bieksa scored a goal in Game 4. The hope was very much alive. And now the Anaheim Outlaws were looking dejected and soulless. There is no worse feeling than to squander a 2-0 series lead.

The series came back to Anaheim for Game 5, where the Outlaws were able once again to squeeze by the Whalers on a minimal margin: Outlaws won 4-3. And the series would come back to Vancouver for the Game 6.
“Our guys are going to be real focused tomorrow. We need to hold serve. We're back in our building. We've played some good hockey. We might feel that we deserve a better outcome than what we have right now, which is trailing by a game. But it doesn't matter. At the end of the day we got to take care of business tomorrow, and that's what we're going to do.”, said Aaron Wilson.

The Game 6 was a completely different story once again, Whalers won 5-3, although the game was much closer than one would think. Mikas Bieksa scored another finals goal, to put up the Whalers 5-2 and the team was real cheery. “Yeah, it's obviously one of the biggest ones of my career so far. I think you can't beat a Four-Star Cup Finals goal. And, you know, to try to change a game like that, it's pretty exciting. I just tried to get my body in there as best I could, and I got a lucky bounce to get in front of the net there.”, Bieksa recalls.

And then came the exciting Game 7. Back in Anaheim, the Outlaws were looking to close this series out and repeat the last season success.

The opening half of the first period featured tentative play by both teams but with both teams scoring goal apiece. However, the Outlaws got the best scoring chances in the first period, as Outlaws out shot the Whalers 8 to 4. Whalers’ shots were stopped by the glove of goaltender Tibuk Soonika almost from point blank range.

At 0:30 in the second period, Vancouver struck first, as Kaspars Claude scored following a turnover. The goal resulted after Noah Tedla attempted to clear the zone following a dump-in by Cullen Gray into Anaheim territory. Aaron Wilson used his skates to block Tedla’s pass, and the puck found its way to Kaspars Claude, who patiently waited to find a shooting lane behind goaltender Tibuk Soonika. Both teams gained chances early through the period, with each goalie coming up strong. On one sequence, Monkey D. Luffy made a quick shot from the left circle, where he was stopped by Braulin. As Anthony Archer set up for a rebound shot, he struck the puck to level the game once again: 2-2.

Sami Rieder and Dale Miller struck again at the end of the period to make it 3-2 and 4-2. Dale Miller curled the puck to fake a pass during a two-on-one break, then lifted it over Tibuk Soonika’s shoulder. After that Anaheim pulled their star goalie, who was on the verge of tears after a disastrous second half. Patrick Niederreiter came onto the ice.

The Whalers started to pressure the Outlaws in the third period and registered lots of shots. At the same time, Anaheim was able to sustain pressure on several occasions during the period. At 16:26, the Whalers got on the board once again, as Bobby Bobcalf drilled a one-timed shot behind Niederreiter, after deflecting a shot from Jax Duggan. Then, at 17:25, Vancouver closed the game, Jax Dugan fanned on a one-time attempt as he took a shot, but after Noah Tedla blocked the shot, Dale Miller regained control of the puck and fired a wrist shot into the net.

Anaheim gained one last chance on the final shift of the game. After shot from Seemu Telanne, the puck squirted toward a wide-open Max Rockatansky. However, Braulin scrambled across the crease to make a diving save with a minute left to seal victory.

The Vancouver Whalers became the first team to win the Four-Star Cup in Anaheim. And the rest is rock and roll history.

The Vancouver Whalers GM Arnost Holub was beyond ecstatic after the win: “It's a dream come true, you know. But there's a lot of hard work and building and laying a foundation every season that goes into it. It doesn't happen without building that foundation on day one and day two. They just don't hand you a trip to the Four-Star Cup Finals. So we're going to enjoy this one. We're going to sit back and relish the moment. We're going to get our names put on that Cup, and we'll all get our day with that, and what that means to us. In short order, I'm sure, come next season we'll get ready to start building the foundation for what this team could possibly do. But that's a whole different thing right now. We're going to enjoy this one.”

- The Draft -

When my agent, Tauras Karazija, prepared me for my team interviews before the S49 SHL draft, it was as if he was providing me my Miranda rights. He told me that everything I say can and will be used against me. It was like receiving your attorney’s instructions on how to testify in a trial. Tauras predicted what questions would be asked, offered sample answers and gave me specific instructions on what I should avoid discussing. To Tauras, the taboo subject was my commitment to the game - or lack thereof. He told me to keep shut about it because he was reasonably sure that philosophical mumbling about the existence of meaning in hockey would scare off some potential suitors.

A few weeks before the draft, I was competing for the Four-Star Cup in the S49 Four-Star Cup Finals when I decided to step out of our hot, cramped, smelly dressing room just to find some fresh air. The problem, as Tauras saw it, was that I had ventured in public without a team representative or him. As soon as he saw me, Tauras ran down the stairs of the bleachers as if he were fleeing a raging fire. “Get back in that dressing room and don’t walk out here again unless you have gear on,” he said. My draft came after the internet exploded with various scouting articles on S49 draft prospects. Today, there are loads of websites that rank potential draft picks and many that provide an overload of information about each prospect. But, funnily enough, in my case, information wasn’t based on what scouts witnessed at the rink rather on what they heard through the grapevine about my eligibility and long-term commitment to an SHL franchise.

Scouts made it clear that they liked my speed, my hands and my defense, but I also heard that SHL teams were concerned about my longevity in the league, my commitment issues, my passion for the game. That was reinforced when the “SHL Gazette” draft preview issue was published during the Four-Star Cup Finals. The magazine’s assessment of my potential was primarily positive, and I was ranked somewhat around the late 1st - early 2nd round.

However, my evaluation stated there were “question marks” about my potential. Those concerns clearly centered on whether I was strong enough to survive in the SHL jungle. And they were not talking about my physical strength. “How committed and passionate is he going to be after he gets drafted?” asked one scout in the article. It didn’t help my cause that every player ranked in the magazine’s first and second rounds were better scouted than me, they were known commodities. I immediately got the silence machine running effectively. I never talked about how much potential I have, what I think about being stashed away until called up to the SHL, but I did say that “SHL Gazette” take on my mental preparedness wasn’t accurate. Most scouts seemed to assume that I was the same kid when I played in Europe. They assumed I was damaged goods and they just let everyone believe that.

The other worry I had was that I was an Lithuania playing junior league hockey with close ties to my country players. Scouts celebrated other prospects because he had gone to the SMJHL Draft to prove themselves, get scouted and evaluated beforehand, and they questioned me because I had stayed in Europe and was, well, a cat in the bag. Even though I had produced 2 goals and 5 assists in 39 games during the regular season and 5 goals in 19 games during the playoffs in my first year as a post-draft free agent, some scouts wanted to discount my statistics on the basis that they had seen this kind of performance from a Lithuanian that did not pan out so well. Although SHL general managers had become far more open-minded about drafting Europeans, they still preferred players that have trained in Canada or USA. That didn’t work in my favour. It also didn’t help my case that I was a very raw player. Scouts had worries about what I planned to do the following season after the draft. The possibility that I might opt to play another season of junior hockey in Europe after the S48 SMJHL season didn’t appeal to the scouting community.

Against that backdrop, Tauras Karazija was steadfast in his belief that I needed to exercise my right to remain silent when it came to my future plans. Or the team I’d like to end up with. I sure as hell wasn’t going to remain silent. From where in the holy cinnamon bun rolls did that whole Europe or longevity, or passion for the game crap came up? Just because I’m Lithuanian? Just because the past few players from my country fucked over their teams? It’s not pretty, and I know that. But I wasn’t Tauras, I wasn’t Jurgis Bulota. I am me. I am Mikas Bieksa. And I’m here to stay. It’s not for the scouts to tell me I have no passion for the game. It’s for GMs to tell me that they don’t see me playing here. I won’t stop until every last of the GMs tell me that they won’t draft me. And still, I wouldn’t stop there, god damn it. I was sure as hell not going to do interviews about my mental state or my passion for the game. But I was sure as hell that I will try and convince every interested GM that I had what it takes to make it to the SHL and be fucking good at it.

Going into the draft, I had a general idea of which general managers were thinking about taking me. We felt there was an outside chance that the Buffalo Stampede might take me with the 19th pick. If the Stampede passed, Tauras figured I could go 20th to Chicago, or 22nd to New England or 23rd to Edmonton. Although there had been some speculation about the San Francisco Pride, with the 27nd, being interested, Tauras believed they wouldn’t take a defenseman with that pick. I thought there was a very good chance I would end up with the Stampede. Buffalo general manager knew me well because I had attended his hockey camps when I was younger. The San Francisco Pride had brought me to San Francisco for an interview and had tested me there along with Colorado Raptors player Heat Siecker. The Pride owned the third, eleventh and twenty-seventh picks. Frankly, I had no idea where I was going to end up, I made sure I said that to anyone. Only one signal that they were quite interested was Pride GM Jeff Kirkstone asking me “Do you find it a bit annoying that people mention your passion for the in these scouting articles?”. It was a curveball question. And I had not prepared an answer for it. So I just said what first came to my head “Yeah, sometimes. But most of the time - who cares? Scouts don’t play the game. They write. I play the game. So I’ll make sure they have something to write about other than my love for the game”.

Closer the draft came, the more mixed signals I would get. The mocks would be shuffling around, but my name was still around 19th - 23rd picks. With the Top-5 being firmly intact. I was ready to vomit my guts out with anxiety before the draft. Will I get picked? Will the team picking me has a plan for or do they just want to draft and forget about me like the scouts seem to write me off? I was nearly having panic attacks from the stress and anxiety. The morning of the draft, I had no idea whether the Pride, the Stampede, the Wolfpack or anyone for that matter would take me, nor did I have any true idea who was thinking about drafting me. But the first glimpse of the things to come would be mock drafts going into a frenzy with me going at number 14 to the New Orleans Specters. “Okay, that’s new, I thought”. But nevertheless, no clear signs whatsoever.

The draft unfolded as expected, with Los Angeles taking the fantastic prospect in Elijah Jones. He truly was a head above everyone in the draft. Then Texas grabbing a fellow defenseman (and a very good one, may I add) Noah Brusky and the Pride taking Bo Kane of the Colorado Raptors. Then the Edmonton Blizzard took a young prospect Finn Rhys of the Halifax Raiders, who was called a longshot and a reach by many. Can I say that is total bullshit? That guy has totally arrived. He just needed some time to adjust to the pace of the SMJHL game. He’s looking like a future stud. The top five rounded up with Texas taking Ricky Spanish, a truly wonderful prospect and a future star for years to come.

Some picks flew buy and I was sitting with a concrete block in my stomach… I already heard loads of half-assed rumors about me not wanting to commit to a team long-term. WHAT. THE FUCK. No, where does this come from? I was ready to dig a hole in the ground and bury myself right there and then. Until…

Until I got a text message from one of the Buffalo GMs that said “RIP #19”. What? Does that mean I’m going earlier? Did they choose to go with a different player? After a few minutes I got a text from the New England Wolfpack GM saying “Best of luck in the SHL, you’ll be a good player”. WHAT DOES THIS MEAN? AM I GOING GET DRAFTED? WHAT? My heart started pounding like crazy, I started to get flop sweat all over me. My ears were ringing, my mouth was dry like the Sahara desert. I just sat at the green room and waited… And waited… A few picks now seemed like a few hours. And then, San Francisco Pride Co-GM Geronimo Otto came onto the stage.

“With the eleventh overall pick of the S49 SHL Draft, the San Francisco Pride select… MIKAS BIEKSA, FROM THE VANCOUVER WHALERS”

… all I heard was a ringing sound in my ears. It seemed that someone took a stab at my eardrums. I was shell-shocked. I AM GOING TO THE SHL, BABY! ELEVENTH PICK!

Both Jeff Kirkstone and Geronimo Otto were San Francisco GMs. They had pushed for me to be the team’s eleventh selection, and through the years I’ve been told that they said that Pride would make a huge mistake if they didn’t select me. They had watched me play at the Four-Star Cup Finals a few weeks before and apparently liked what they saw. “The two games in Vancouver, he was right there on a par with Noah Brusky,” Kirkstone told Otto. Kirkstone told the media he thought I had an outside chance to make the Pride in a couple of seasons if I signed. “He looks like a quick learner. A few players have made that jump from Europe to Juniors and to the SHL, players like Hippo Passamus or Ola Wagstrom.”

Pride GMs had prepared me to deal with the media. What I wanted to say was that I wanted to play in San Francisco in a couple of seasons. What I told the media was “I’ll do whatever the San Francisco want. I have one-year offers from European teams, and I’ll go to one of those teams if they want, or I’ll go play in SMJHL for as long as they want me to.” When the Pride indicated they wanted to sign me right away, I was far more excited than anyone in the draft was.

And I guess this is the start of something new for me. Again.