A chat with the chairman . . .

Bruce Hamilton, the president and general manager of the Kelowna Rockets and the chairman of the WHL’s board of governors, was in Kamloops on Saturday and watched his club drop a 5-3 decision to the Blazers.
Hamilton is always candid and we had time for a brief chat during the second intermission. We didn’t have a lot of time, but we touched on attendance, the resurgence of the Portland Winterhawks and his own hockey team, which just happens to be the WHL’s defending champion.
So here is Bruce Hamilton . . .
On attendance in the WHL: “You don’t get a true test until that run from Dec. 25 to Jan. 20 . . . kind of in that range. But I think we have some teams certainly that are way behind right now. And I know there are two or three that it has really been a big hit. On the other side, there’s some teams . . . I think Tri-City is up. But there is concern. The commissioner for sure is zeroing in on it. The marketing people meet in another week or two and the guest speaker will be a ticket guy.”
On whether it’s entirely the economy: “I think our people have to get out and work harder to sell tickets probably, and I think the economy is a bit of it. But I think we have to really be careful on our price point. We may all be at an area where you have to stand still for a while and let things catch up.”
On the WHL as family entertainment: “I think that it’s really important that we have kids in the building. We’re a team that needs kids in the building. They have a lot to do with the atmosphere and we are supposed to be family entertainment.”
On what is happening in Portland: “We’re really happy with what’s happened with the team. We just need to see some people coming. If they can stay on the pace they’re on, once they get through Christmas it’ll be interesting. They play 18 games in the Rose Garden and they probably decided that’s where they’re going to market this hockey club this season. I know one thing about Portland . . . if you’re winning they’ll come. . . . It’s a signal to all of us how far things can go the wrong way. There’s no magic wand. Once you turn them off it isn’t just winning alone. They have to be comfortable that the product is going to be good for a while.”
On his own team: “I like our goalie (Adam Brown). I think he’s coming along real well. Obviously, young (Shane) McGolgan is going to be a real firepot for our league. He’s a great acquisition. Our defence is all young, with what we lost two years in a row (Luke Schenn to the Toronto Maple Leafs and Tyler Myers to the Buffalo Sabres) it’s difficult to maintain that. Up front, Kyle St. Denis has gotten off to a good start. Brandon McMillan will get going now that he’s back healthy again. We need some mileage out of Lucas Bloodoff, other than just grinding it out. He’s a 20-year-old, really our only 20-year-old, so he’s got to give us more.
On the injuries that hit his club hard: “We were a lot of games without 19 or 20 guys in our lineup. On the other side of it, that opened up an opportunity for some other guys to get some time here. (Forward Cody) Chikie, for example . . . all he’s done is play hard enough to stay here. There were many days early on when we were trying to send him home and we can’t. He has earned himself a longer look now. We’re very inexperienced on the back end and Tyson Barrie can only do so much.”