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D Nick Ross (Regina, Kamloops, Vancouver, 2004-09) has signed a one-year contract with Zvolen (Slovakia, Extraliga). This season, with Innsbruck (Austria, Erste Bank Liga), he had seven goals and 25 assists in 50 games.
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The San Francisco Giants are riding what Major League Baseball says is a 517-game sellout streak. But if you watch their home games at AT&T Park you will see lots of empty seats.
Still, the Giants have announced a sellout for every game they have played since Oct. 1, 2010, including Friday’s night’s ?? victory over the Minnesota Twins.
As Alex Pavlovic wrote in the San Jose Mercury News when the streak was 240 games old: “A sellout is official when the club distributes 41,500 tickets, through a combination of paid tickets and complimentary ones. The rules say nothing about fans actually showing up.”
Which brings us to the WHL.
Fans of many WHL teams are used to attending games, hearing the announced attendances and knowing that the number is greater than the number of bums in the seats at those games.
Still, it’s interesting to see the difference between the announced and actual attendance figures when the opportunity to look at such numbers presents itself.
Take the case of the Spokane Chiefs.
According to the Spokane Public Facilities District’s year-end report for 2016, there was a discrepancy of
59,545 fans between the announced attendances and the scanned attendances at 40 Chiefs home games from Jan. 9 to Dec. 30.
The SPFD operates the Spokane Veterans Memorial Arena, the home of the Chiefs. The WHL’s 2016-17 Guide lists its capacity at 10,366.
For those 40 games, the total announced attendance was 234,989, while the number of scanned tickets was 175,444.
According to the announced attendances, the Chiefs had three crowds larger than 9,000 in that calendar year, each of them for a visit by the Tri-City Americans — 9,839 on Jan 30, 9,534 on Feb. 20, and 9,352 on March 11. The scanned attendances, however, were 8,128, 7,578 and 7,303.
For this season’s home-opener, against the Americans, the Chiefs announced a crowd of 8,108. According to the SPFD report, the scanned attendance was 6,446.
The Chiefs played 21 games from Oct. 1 through Dec. 30. The total announced attendance was 113,138, while the scanned attendance was 82,243, a difference of 30,895.
BTW, have you ever wondered how much revenue is generated by alcohol sales at WHL games? I don’t know if Chiefs’ games are typical, but their 40 home games in 2016 brought in $238,928 in booze sales, with $109,907 of that going to the team.
Some other figures of interest from those 40 games:
Concession sales totalled $252,495, with the team’s cut $116,148.
Parking generated $168,151, with the Chiefs getting $62,766 of that.
The Chiefs didn’t make the playoffs this season, but were there in the spring of 2016 when they had three home games against the Victoria Royals. The announced attendances were 3,544, 3,612 and 3,104, while the scanned totals were 2,288, 2,416 and 2,347.
The Royals won that best-of-seven first-round series, 4-2.
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In the 2010 calendar year, the Chiefs played 38 home games. The announced attendance was 243,202, while the turnstile count was 198,592, a difference of 44,610.
In 2011, the difference for 43 games (285,142 versus 227,911) was 57,231.
For 43 games in 2012, the difference was 54,623, with announced attendances totalling 282,294 and a turnstile count of 227,671.
In 2013, the announced attendance was 251,770, with a turnstile count of 198,675, a difference of 53,095.
In 2014, the discrepancy was 12,925, the smallest for the seven years for which Taking Note has figures, after the announced attendance total was 227,293 and the turnstile count was 214,368.
In 2015, the announced attendance was 231,135 against a turnstile count of 169,089, for a difference of 62,046.
For the past seven calendar years, the Chiefs have overstated their actual game attendance by 286,844 fans.
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The Chiefs, of course, aren’t the only WHL team that has a discrepancy like this. In April 2016, Bob Mackin reported in Business in Vancouver that the Vancouver Giants had an average announced attendance of 5,169 at Pacific Coliseum for the 2015-16 season, but the real average was 3,332.
In a story that is right here, Mackin wrote: “Over the last three seasons, the Giants publicly overstated attendance by 205,000. The actual average per-game gate count plummeted by almost 1,000 from 4,269 in 2013-14 to 3,332 in 2015-16.”
The Giants left Pacific Coliseum for the 5,276-seat Langley Events Centre prior to this season.
In his story, Mackin quoted a report by Prof. Christopher Keshock of the U of South Alabama, who had done an attendance study of the 2015 Senior Bowl NCAA football game in Mobile, Ala.
“Exaggerated crowd sizes at an event can be a common practice used in public relations marketing announcements,” Keshock wrote,“but it compromises event evaluation reliability and overstates economic impact estimates.”
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The Victoria Royals have scheduled a news conference for Monday at which they will “announce our new head coach and other changes in our hockey ops department.” . . . The new head coach will replace Dave Lowry, who left after five seasons to join the NHL’s Los Angeles Kings as an assistant coach. . . . The Royals will be the fourth of the WHL’s 22 teams to sign a new head coach this off-season, while the Calgary Hitmen have yet to replace Mark French, who left after three seasons to coach in Switzerland. . . . The Everett Silvertips signed Dennis Williams to replace Kevin Constantine, whose contract wasn’t renewed. . . . The Kootenay Ice signed James Patrick earlier this week to replace Luke Pierce, who was fired by new owners after two seasons there. . . . The Spokane Chiefs introduced Dan Lambert his week; he takes over from Don Nachbaur, the head coach for the previous seven seasons.
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The third annual Ryan Donaldson Memorial Hockey Tournament is on this weekend at the Langley, B.C., Sportsplex. There are 100 players registered on eight teams. . . . “The Donaldson family started the tournament to raise awareness about concussions and mental health — subjects near to their hearts,” Gary Ahuja writes in the Langley Times. “Ryan suffered at least three major concussions and shortly before he took his own life, he had exhibited significant changes in his behaviour.” . . . Ahuja’s story is right here and it’s well worth reading. . . . You also may want to check out an app that was created by Ryan’s sister, Kirsten. That app is right here, and it includes all the info you’ll need, including where and when for beer-and-burger night, and a link to a spot where you are able to make a donation.
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The Regina Pats have signed F Rayman Bassi, 17, whom they listed during this season. The 5-foot-11, 175-pound Bassi is from Kelowna. This season, he had 16 goals and 33 assists in 40 games with the Kelowna-based Okanagan Rockets of the B.C. Major Midget Hockey League.
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The Kootenay Ice has signed D Anson McMaster, who was a second-round selection in the WHL’s 2017 bantam draft. From the Sikiska Nation, Alta., the 6-foot-4, 175-pounder this season had 15 goals and 24 assists in 36 games with the Rocky Mountain Raiders of the Alberta Major Bantam Hockey League.
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BTW, if you want to contact me with some information or just feel like commenting on something, you may email me at greggdrinnan@gmail.com.
I’m also on Twitter (@gdrinnan).
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The NHL’s Vegas Golden Knights have added former Brandon Wheat Kings captain Ryan Craig to their coaching staff. Craig, 35, joins head coach Gerard Gallant and assistant coach Mike Kelly with the Knights. . . . Craig, who is from Abbotsford, B.C., has retired as a player after a 14-season pro career that included 198 NHL games. He played the past two seasons with the AHL‘s Cleveland Monsters. . . . He played five seasons (1998-2003) with the Wheat Kings, who are owned by Kelly McCrimmon, the Golden Knights’ assistant GM. . . . Kelly was the Wheat Kings’ head coach for part of one season. . . . The team’s front office also includes Vaughn Karpan, the director of player personnel, and Bob Lowes, the assistant director of player personnel. Both have ties to the Wheat Kings, Karpan having played for them and Lowes having coached them.
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in Game 5 of the Calder Cup final. The Monarchs won the series, 4-1. . . . This was Manchester’s first and last AHL title as the Monarchs will move to Ontario, Calif., over the summer where they will become part of the new Pacific Division. . . . The Monarchs are the AHL affiliate of the NHL’s Los Angeles Kings, while the Comets are hooked up with the Vancouver Canucks. . . . Former Moose Jaw Warriors head coach Mike Stothers was in his first season as the Monarchs’ head coach. . . . Utica head coach Travis Green was in his second season after working as the Portland Winterhawks’ assistant GM/assistant coach. . . . Last night, the Monarchs got first-period goals from F Adrian Kempe (10:02) and D Vincent LoVerde (13:09, PP). . . . F Cal O’Reilly scored for the Comets at 19:45 of the third. . . . Monarchs G Patrik Bartosak (Red Deer Rebels, 2011-14) stopped 31 shots in his second pro playoff start. He made his first playoff start in Friday’s 6-3 victory. . . . Manchester F Jordan Weal (Regina Pats, 2007-12) was honoured as the AHL’s playoff MVP. He had 22 points, including 10 goals, in 19 playoff games. . . . Attendance was 3,835.
The SJHL’s Flin Flon Bombers have acquired F Jesse Shynkaruk, 19, who finished last season with the WHL’s Moose Jaw Warriors. . . . The Bombers acquired D Joel Webb and Shynkaruk from the Kindersley Klippers for F Austin Calladine. . . . In 132 WHL games, with the Kamloops Blazers and Moose Jaw, Shynkaruk has 13 goals and 15 assists. . . . There’s more on this deal 
yet to made a decision on whether to join the front office of the NHL’s Toronto Maple Leafs. . . . However, it would seem that at least some readers of this blog don’t expect him to leave the Wheat Kings. . . . Our most-recent poll, asked who would coach the Wheat Kings in 2015-16 and 63 of 94 respondents (67 per cent) suggested it will be McCrimmon. . . . Andy Murray, who is from Souris, which is located a couple of slap shots south west of Brandon, drew 11 votes even though he is the head coach at Western Michigan. . . . Malcolm Cameron, a former Regina Pats head coach who is on staff at the Okanagan Hockey Academy in Penticton, B.C., drew eight votes, while former Brandon Sun sports editor James Shewaga got six. . . . The Wheat Kings’ two assistant coaches, David Anning and Darren Ritchie, drew five and one votes, respectively.
In Prince Albert, G Nick McBride stopped 24 shots to lead the Raiders to a 3-0 victory over the Spokane Chiefs. . . . It was McBride’s second shutout of the season and second of his career. It was his first victory in 12 decisions, too. . . . Raiders F Tim Vanstone scored his eighth goal at 2:56 of the second period and it stood up as the winner. . . . The Raiders struck for three goals in 4:07, with F Colton Heffley getting his fifth at 6:41 and F Matteo Gennaro getting No. 9 at 7:03. . . . Chiefs G Garret Hughson stopped 27 shots. . . . F Craig Leverton had two assists. . . . Eleven of the 16 minor penalties called in the game were for roughing. . . . Each team was 0-for-4 on the PP. . . . Vanstone left in the second period with an undisclosed injury and didn’t return. . . . The Raiders (23-31-2) have won two in a row. They have 16 games remaining and are seven points out of a playoff spot. . . . Spokane (26-24-4), which has been shutout in five of its last 11 games, is 2-2-0 on its six-game East Division trip. The Chiefs, who are in Brandon on Friday, hold down the Western Conference’s first wild-card spot. . . . Jeff D’Andrea of panow.com has a game story 
In Cranbrook, the Kootenay Ice scored five second-period goals and went on to beat the Medicine Hat Tigers, 6-3. . . . Ice F Levi Cable, who was playing his 250th game, got the game’s first goal, his 24th, just 59 seconds into the first period. . . . Ice F Jaedon Descheneau picked up his 150th career assist on Cable’s goal. . . . Tigers F Cole Sanford scored his WHL-leading 44th goal on a PP at 2:54 of the second. He’s riding a 12-game point streak. . . . Ice D Rinat Valiev broke the tie with his eighth goal at 11:07 and the Ice added four more before the period ended. . . . Cable and Valiev each had two assists, as did F Luke Philp. . . . Ice F Tim Bozon scored his 22nd goal and added his 150th career assist. . . . Descheneau added his 25th goal, while F Sam Reinhart got No. 13. . . . With head coach Ryan McGill ill and unavailable, assistant coach Jay Henderson ran the Kootenay bench. . . . The Ice had D Tanner Faith back on their bench, but he was in the role of an assistant coach. He is recovering from season-ending shoulder surgery. . . . The Tigers were without D Ty Stanton (ill), but had D Tyler Lewington, their captain, back from a one-game suspension. . . . The Ice (28-26-1) had lost its previous three games. It owns the Eastern Conference’s first wild-card spot, one point up on Edmonton. . . . The Tigers (36-16-3) lead the Central Division by six points over Calgary. . . . Taylor Rocca of the Cranbrook Daily Townsman has a game story 
In Calgary, the Hitmen ran their winning streak to nine games with a 4-3 five-round shootout victory over the Prince George Cougars. . . . F Brad Morrison scored for the Cougars in the first round of the shootout, with F Adam Tambellini countering for the Hitmen in the second round. . . . F Connor Rankin won it in the fifth round. . . . Cougars G Ty Edmonds stopped 49 shots through OT. . . . Morrison forced OT with his 20th goal at 12:00 of the third period. . . . The Hitmen led 2-0 in the second period, only to have the Cougars tie it on D Tate Olson’s fifth goal, on a PP, at 1:20 of the third. . . . F Jake Virtanen shot Calgary back into the lead with his 15th goal at 11:13. . . . Tambellini had two assists, while D Travis Sanheim scored his 11th goal and added an assist. . . . Calgary F Kenton Helgesen, the team captain, scored his 18th goal of the season in what was his 250th career game. . . . Morrison also had an assist, while F Zach Pochiro got his 10th goal and added an assist. . . . Calgary G Brendan Burke stopped 19 shots. . . . The Hitmen (32-17-5) are second in the Central Division, six points behind Medicine Hat. . . . The Cougars (21-32-4) are 0-1-2 in their last three games. They are fifth in the B.C. Division, but just three points behind third-place Vancouver. . . . 
In Vancouver, F Carter Popoff scored twice to help the Giants to a 3-1 victory over the Edmonton Oil Kings. . . . Edmonton F Lane Bauer scored his 18th goal at 9:42 of the first period. . . . The Giants scored the game’s last three goals. . . . Popoff tied it at 7:33 of the second period and F Vladimir Bobylev got his third just 44 seconds later. . . . Popoff, who has 22 goals, iced it with an empty-netter at 19:34 of the third. . . . Vancouver G Cody Porter stopped 31 shots. . . . Giants G Payton Lee, who has been out with a hand injury, was on the bench backing up Porter. . . . Edmonton G Tristan Jarry blocked 21 shots. He played in his 148th career game to set a franchise record. He had shared the mark with Laurent Brossoit. . . . Vancouver F Tyler Benson had two assists. . . . Vancouver D Arvin Atwal was eligible to return from a WHL suspension, but he was a healthy scratch. . . . Vancouver (23-29-3) has won two in a row and has moved into third place in the B.C. Division, one point ahead of idle Kamloops. The Giants have a game in hand. . . . Edmonton (25-26-6) has lost two straight; it went 1-3-0 on a trip into the B.C. Division, scoring only six goals in the process. The Oil Kings hold down the Eastern Conference’s second wild-card spot. . . . Steve Ewen of the Vancouver Province has a game story 
In Everett, the Tri-City Americans erased 2-0 and 3-2 deficits as they beat the Silvertips 4-3 in a shootout. . . . F Vladislav Lukin scored the lone goal of the three-round shootout. Lukin, a freshman from Ufa, Russia, isn’t believed to be related to former Kamloops Blazers captain Jaret Lukin. . . . This really was a wild one. . . . Everett led 2-0 after one period — on goals from F Patrick Bajkov, his 20th, and Remi Laurencelle, his 15th — and took that lead into the third. . . . The Americans tied it on D Brendan O’Reilly’s first goal, at 7:23 of the third, and F Lucas Nickles’ 20th just 12 seconds later. . . . F Nikita Scherbak put Everett back out front with his 23rd goal at 12:05. . . . Tri-City pulled even on F Beau McCue’s 21st goal at 14:28. . . . D Brandon Carlo had two assists for the Americans. . . . Everett G Austin Lotz stopped 26 shots through OT, three more than Tri-City’s Eric Comrie. . . . F Parker Bowles was among the Americans’ scratches. Bowles, who leads the Americans in assists and points, left a 3-0 loss in Kamloops on Sunday with an apparent injury to his left arm or shoulder. . . . The Americans also scratched D Riley Hillis (suspended), D Tyler Morrison (undisclosed injury) and D Dylan Coghlan (undisclosed injury). Tri-City F Braden Purtill moved back to defence for this one. . . . The Americans (26-26-3) are fifth in the U.S. Division, but are in the Western Conference’s second wild-card spot. . . . Everett (34-16-5) leads the U.S. Division by seven points over idle Portland. . . . Nick Patterson of the Everett Herald has a game story 
State House Committee on Labor in the state capital of Olympia on Tuesday.
In Saskatoon, the Spokane Chiefs scored three times in the first 3:08 of the game and went on to a 6-3 victory over the Chiefs. . . . F Adam Helewka scored his 29th goal just 22 seconds into the game to get the visitors started. He later added an assist. . . . F Jacob Cardiff added his third at 1:07 and F Jackson Playfair got his ninth at 3:08. . . . F Liam Stewart had two goals for Spokane, giving him 19, while F Kailer Yamamoto ended a 10-game goalless drought with his 17th goal and two assists. . . . F Wyatt Sloboshan had two assists for the Blades, while D Brycen Martin got his sixth goal and also had an assist. . . . The Chiefs (26-23-4) are 2-1-0 on a six-game swing through the East Division that continues tonight in Prince Albert. Spokane holds down the Western Conference’s first wild-card spot. . . . The Blades (15-35-3) have lost four in a row. . . . Daniel Nugent-Bowman of the Saskatoon StarPhoenix has a game story 
In Medicine Hat, the Tigers scored the only two goals of a shootout and beat the Regina Pats, 5-4. . . . Tigers F Markus Eisenschmid forced OT when he scored his second goal of the game and 17th of the season with 15.6 seconds left in the third period. . . . F Dryden Hunt and F Cole Sanford scored the shootout goals. . . . F Austin Wagner’s 18th goal, at 1:01 of the third period, gave the Pats a 3-1 lead. . . . The Tigers tied it on goals from Eisenschmid, at 6:53, and D Kyle Burroughs, on a PP, at 8:32. Burroughs has six goals. . . . Regina F Braden Christoffer gave his side the lead with his 17th goal at 9:52. . . . Hunt had two assists. . . . F Pavel Padakin scored twice for the Pats, giving him 19. . . . Regina G Daniel Wapple stopped 45 shots through OT, 18 more than Medicine Hat’s Marek Langhamer. . . . The Tigers (36-15-3) had lost four in a row (0-3-1). They now lead the Central Division by eight points over the Calgary Hitmen, who have won eight straight. . . . The Pats (30-17-7), who are a comfortable second in the East Division, have points in six straight (4-0-2). . . .
In Kent, Wash., D Jerret Smith’s PP goal at 16:26 of the third period gave the Seattle Thunderbirds a 2-1 victory over the Kelowna Rockets. . . . Smith has six goals this season. . . . F Nick Merkley gave the Rockets a 1-0 lead with his 17th goal at 9:14 of the second period. . . . F Mathew Barzal pulled Seattle even with his 10th goal at 10:22 of the third. . . . Barzal also drew an assist on the winner. . . . Seattle G Taran Kozun stopped 32 shots, seven more than Kelowna’s Michael Herringer, who suffered his first loss in six decisions. . . . According to the Thunderbirds, there were 42 NHL scouts at the game. . . . The Thunderbirds were 1-for-4 on the PP; the Rockets were 0-for-6. . . . Kelowna played its second game without F Tyson Baillie, who took a shot to the head in Kamloops on Saturday. The Rockets also are missing G Jackson Whistle (appendectomy). . . . Kelowna F Tomas Soustal didn’t play. He drew a ‘tbd’ suspension for a charging major and game misconduct he incurred on Monday against Prince George. . . . Seattle improved to 28-20-6 and closed to within four points of second-place Portland in the U. S. Division. Seattle holds a game in hand. . . . The Rockets (42-9-4) had points in each of their previous nine games (8-0-1).
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