D Deron Quint (Seattle, 1993-95) has signed a two-year contract with Traktor Chelyabinsk (Russia, KHL). Last season, with CSKA Moscow and Spartak Moscow (both Russia, KHL), Quint had 28 points, 13 of them goals, in 51 games. He led KHL defencemen in goals, and he also won the hardest-shot part of the KHL all-star game skills competition. . . .
F Boštjan Goličič (Calgary, 2007-09) has signed a one-year contract with Gap (France, Ligue Magnus). Last season, with Briançon (France, Ligue Magnus), he had 24 points, including 10 goals, in 21 games. . . .
F Riley Armstrong (Kootenay, Everett, 2002-04) has signed a one-year contract with Vita Hästen Norrkoping (Sweden, Allsvenskan). Last season, with Landshut (Germany, DEL2), he put up 64 points, including 24 goals, in 45 games. He led the team in goals, assists and points, finishing eighth in the league’s scoring race. . . .
D Alexander Urbom (Brandon, 2009-10) has signed a two-year contract with Severstal Cherepovets (Russia, KHL). Last season, with Washington (NHL), he had a goal and an assist in 20 games. With Albany (AHL), Urbom had 11 points, including one goal, in 35 games.
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The WHL’s Swift Current Broncos are scheduled to hold a news conference on Friday.
They aren’t expected to announce any contract extensions or any player transactions.
Instead, they will announce that they are getting into the tractor-pull business.
When you are the community-owned Broncos and you are fighting to stay alive in a league in which there is neither revenue sharing nor an expenses cap, you play host to things like the Professional Bull Riders (PBR) circuit. The Broncos already have done that this season.
They also have been known to promote the odd concert, although that has been something of a hit-and-miss proposition and, after a Dwight Yoakam show last fall wasn’t didn’t go over the way they had hoped, they may have second thoughts of doing that again.
But when you’re the Broncos you have to experiment; you have to always be searching for new revenue streams.
Why?
Well . . .
The Portland Winterhawks drew 371,377 fans to 47 home games during the 2013-14 WHL season. That is an average of 7,902 fans per game and it explains why, as owner Bill Gallacher said during his club’s fourth straight appearance in the WHL’s championship series, the Winterhawks have a larger scouting staff than some NHL teams.
Meanwhile, the Broncos drew 84,905 fans to 39 games, three of which were in the postseason. That works out to an average of 2,177.
On Friday, the Broncos will hold a news conference at which they will provide details for the 2014 Redhead Equipment Case IH Tractor Pulls presented by Bourgault Industries.
When you are the Winterhawks, there aren’t any tractor pulls in your future and you don’t bring the bull-riders to town.
With the Broncos, it’s a completely different story. In fact, it’s bull-riding and tractor pulls . . . or perhaps the death of a franchise.
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F Brayden Watts has signed with the WHL’s Moose Jaw Warriors. He’s from Bakersfield, Calif., so perhaps he’ll bring some of that Bakersfield sound to Rob Carnie and CHAB. . . . Watts was a third-round selection in the WHL’s 2014 draft after playing last season with the U-14 AAA Arizona Bobcats. . . . For more on Watts and a couple of other Americans prospects, check out this story right here from Matthew Gourlie of the Moose Jaw Times-Herald. It was published late last month as the Warriors were holding their prospects camp.
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