Broncos, Pats set for Game 7 . . . Tigers, 'Canes going to 7, too; PP difference in Game 6

Playoff hockey... pic.twitter.com/4GNoLYVECu

— Zach Werenski (@ZachWerenski) April 17, 2017

Hey @ZachWerenski, I love your grit. No worries, scars heal. pic.twitter.com/IAxkXDmFRh

— Nathan Dempsey (@ndempsey21) April 17, 2017

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The WHL’s Eastern Conference second round is down to a pair of Game 7s.

The first goes tonight (Monday) in Regina between the Pats and Swift Current Broncos. On Tuesday, in Medicine Hat, the Tigers and Lethbridge Hurricanes will settle things.

In Regina, fans began lining up at the Brandt Centre box office Sunday at 10 a.m., in order to get tickets to tonight’s Game 7 between the Pats and Swift Current Broncos. The box office opened at noon and the game was SRO in a hurry.

There even was a report late Sunday that at least one online scalper was trying to get $100 apiece for four tickets. The Pats went so far as to tweet this warning: “Please be advised do not try and purchase tickets to Game 7 from a secondary ticket website. We only support Ticketmaster.”

The Broncos won three of the series’ first four games, each victory coming in OT, to take a 3-1 lead. On Saturday, leading the series 3-2, they held a 3-1 edge early in the second period, only to have the Pats come back for a series-tying 5-3 victory.

“It’s going to be a war,” Regina F Austin Wagner told Greg Harder of the Regina Leader-Post. “We're expecting a hard performance out of them (in Game 7). We have to be ready to play because we know they’re going to be.”

Wagner, of course, took a kneeing major and game misconduct in Game 5, but the WHL chose not to suspend him for Game 6. He responded with two goals and an assist, and was named the game’s first star.

Richard Doerksen, the WHL’s vice-president, hockey, handles discipline and was in Regina for Game 5 so witnessed Wagner’s hit on Broncos F Ryley Lindgren.

“I had a pretty good sleep (Friday night) . . . surprisingly,” Wagner told Harder. “Getting a major wasn’t ideal but I got the nod (Saturday) morning when I came to the rink. As far as I knew I was in the lineup until I was told I’m not. I was ready to go.”

A year ago, the Pats had their season come to an end in a second-round Game 7 when they dropped a 2-1 decision to the host Red Deer Rebels.

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F Eetu Tuulola of the Everett Silvertips may need surgery to repair an injury suffered during the playoffs.

EETU TUULOLA

Jesse Geleynse of the Everett Herald reports that Tuulola suffered a broken right hand in the series against the Seattle Thunderbirds, “but played through the injury in Friday’s game.” . . . Tuulola is expected to see a specialist this week. . . . The Thunderbirds posted a ?? victory on Friday to sweep the Silvertips from the second-round series. . . . Tuulola, a Finnish freshman, had 31 points, including 18 goals, in 62 games during the regular season. He added seven points, six of them goals, in 10 playoff games. . . . He was a sixth-round selection by the Calgary Flames in the NHL’s 2016 draft, but the hand injury likely will keep him from joining their AHL affiliate, the Stockton Heat.

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In the OHL, the Owen Sound Attack eliminated the Soo Greyhounds on Sunday to reach the Western Conference final. The Attack, whose head coach is former WHL player/coach Ryan McGill, won 1-0 yesterday. That was its fourth straight victory as it won the series, 4-2. . . . The Attack will meet either the Erie Otters or London Knights in the conference final. The Knights posted a 2-1 OT victory yesterday to tie that series, 3-3. They’ll play Game 7 in Erie on Tuesday. Kris Knoblauch, another former WHL player/coach, is the Otters’ head coach. . . . The OHL’s Eastern Conference final will feature the Mississauga Steelheads and Peterborough Petes.

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SUNDAY’S GAME:

Cheering on @tigershockey all the way from Spain! It may be 3:00 in the morning but we're cheering hard. Go Tigers Go!!! pic.twitter.com/eser8J2cOe

— Maria Matulin (@matulinmar) April 17, 2017

At Lethbridge, the Medicine Hat Tigers scored three PP goals and beat the Hurricanes, 5-2. . . . The

MASON SHAW

second-round series is tied, 3-3. They’ll decide it with Game 7 in Medicine Hat on Tuesday night. . . . Medicine Hat F Steve Owre (3) broke a 2-2 tie, with his side’s third PP goal, at 4:20 of the third period. . . . F Matt Bradley (3) added insurance at 11:55, and F John Dahlstrom (6) got the empty-netter, at 18:11. . . . Medicine Hat had taken a 1-0 lead when F Max Gerlach (5) scored at 5:13 of the first period. . . . The Hurricanes pulled even when F Egor Babenko scored at 9:48. . . . Bradley put Medicine Hat back out front at 13:00, only to have Babenko tie it with his sixth playoff goal, at 15:03. . . . The Tigers got three assists from F Mason Shaw and two each from Dahlstrom and D David Quenneville. Bradley added one to his goal. . . . F Tyler Wong had two assists for Lethbridge. . . . The Tigers got 24 saves from G Michael Bullion, while Stuart Skinner turned aside 32 shots at the other end. . . . The Tigers were 3-6 on the PP; The Hurricanes were 1-3. . . . The Hurricanes were somewhat shorthanded as they scratched D Calen Addison, F Matt Alfaro, F Zane Franklin, F Ryan Vandervlis and F Zak Zborosky. . . . Announced attendance: 5,034.

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MONDAY’S GAME (all times local):

Swift Current at Regina, 7 p.m. (Series tied, 3-3)

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TUESDAY’S GAME (all times local):

Lethbridge at Medicine Hat, 7 p.m. (Series tied, 3-3)

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Giants get their coach . . . Guess who's back with Hurricanes?

It has been quite a while since Taking Note has included a poll. But there is one here today.
With three WHL franchises having indicated they are likely to bid on the 2016 Memorial Cup tournament, I thought it would be fun to see how readers of this blog feel about the subject.
So . . . there’s a poll over there on the right. Please take a moment and make your choice.
Thank you.
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F Jens Meilleur (Brandon, 2010-14) has signed a one-year contract with the Kassel Huskies (Germany, DEL2). He has dual Canadian-German citizenship. Last season, with Brandon (WHL), he had 26 points, including 11 goals, in 67 games.
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Trilight Entertainment, which purchased an option on Sudden Death: The Incredible Saga of the 1986 Swift Current Broncos, is still hoping to do some of the filming in the southwestern Saskatchewan city.
Shayne Putzlocher, a producer with Trilight Entertainment, was in Swift Current on Tuesday “doing some preliminary scouting and meetings,” he said via email. “(We are) still trying to do what we can to shoot some of this movie in Swift.”
The book, which was published in November 2012, takes a look at how the Broncos dealt with the aftermath of a bus accident in which four players died and how the team went on to win the 1989 Memorial Cup championship. (If you haven’t read it yet, you may order it over there on the right.)
To date, Trilight Entertainment has received funding from Telefilm Canada and the Alberta Media Fund, and a first draft script is being written.
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1. And then there were two. . . . The Vancouver Giants will introduce a new head coach this morning, leaving only the Moose Jaw Warriors and Regina Pats as WHL teams without head coaches. . . . The Warriors are looking to replace Mike Stothers, now the head coach of the AHL’s Manchester Monarchs. The Pats’ new owners created a vacancy when they fired Malcolm Cameron last month. . . . One rumour that just won’t go away has Lorne Molleken and David Struch signing in Regina as head coach and assistant coach. Molleken was the Pats’ head coach in 2000-01 when they were the host team for the Memorial Cup. Most recently, he was the general manager of the Saskatoon Blades, but he was dropped after last season. Struch, Molleken’s long-time assistant coach in Saskatoon, spent last season as the Blades’ head coach and was fired following the season. . . . Meanwhile, Cameron has expressed an interest in the Warriors’ vacancy. . . . Hey, wouldn’t it make things interesting if Molleken and Struch do end up in Regina and Cameron surfaces as the Warriors’ head coach? . . . Now that would add some heat to some rivalries!

2. The Vancouver Giants have signed Troy Ward as their head coach and are scheduled to introduce him at a news conference this morning. Ward will replace Don Hay, who left to return to his hometown of Kamloops and work as the Blazers’ head coach. The Giants have been looking for a new coach since May 1. . . . Ward, a 52-year-old native of St. Paul, Minn., spent the last three seasons as the head coach of the Abbotsford Heat, the AHL affiliate of the NHL’s Calgary Flames. His contract wasn’t renewed following last season. . . . Ward also spent part of a season (34 games in 2005-06) as head coach of the Victoria Salmon Kings, a now-defunct ECHL franchise. . . . Ward, a coach since 1990-91, hasn’t coached junior hockey since 1993-95 when he was the head coach of the USHL’s Dubuque Fighting Saints. He spent three seasons (2002-05) on the coaching staff at the U of Wisconsin.

3. The Abbotsford Heat, of course, have relocated to Glens Falls, N.Y., where they now are the Adirondack Flames. The parent Calgary Flames reached into Kelowna and signed Rockets head coach Ryan Huska to replace Troy Ward as the head coach of their AHL affiliate. . . . Calgary has yet to sign any assistant coaches for Adirondack and a source told me Tuesday night that Mark Ferner will be joining the AHL team’s staff. Ferner, 48, spent last season as the associate coach with the Kamloops Blazers. . . . He and Huska, 39, both played junior in Kamloops.

4. The Prince George Cougars did the expected on Tuesday, naming Todd Harkins as their new general manager. . . . Harkins, 45, had been head scout and director of player personnel at the time of an ownership change earlier this summer. When former GM Dallas Thompson wasn’t kept on, Harkins stepped in as interim GM. . . . According to team president Greg Pocock, “We took the time needed to make sure that we got the best person for the job. We had 17 candidates, talked to eight, interviewed five and hired the best one -- Todd Harkins.” . . . Harkins is a former Miami University player who went on to play in the NHL, with the Calgary Flames and Hartford Whalers. He retired in 2001 after a four-year stretch in Germany. . . . Later, he worked as the hockey director at the North Shore Winter Club. He also coached the major midget Vancouver Northwest Giants to back-to-back provincial titles in 2011 and 2012. . . . Harkins also is the answer to a trivia question: “Who played Russian forward Valeri Kharlamov in the movie Miracle? . . . Harkins’ son Jansen is heading into his second season with the Cougars. Jansen was the second overall pick in the 2012 WHL bantam draft. . . . Harkins’ contract is for four years, with an option for a fifth season. . . . The Cougars are expected to name a new director of player personnel in the not too distant future.

5. The Cougars also gave head coach Mark Holick a contract extension. Holick had expressed an interest in the general manager’s position, but it’s believed that he was told as early as April that the new owners, EDGEPRO Sports, preferred to split the general manager and coaching duties. . . . Holick, 45, is preparing for his second full season as the Cougars’ head coach. He replaced Dean Clark in January 2013. Holick, who had two years left on his contract, received a two-year extension and now is signed through 2017-18. . . . Holick’s family spent last season at their home in Penticton, but wife Janet is planning on moving to Prince George this summer. . . . A former WHL player (Saskatoon, New Westminster, 1984-88), Holick was the head coach of the Kootenay Ice for three seasons (2007-10). . . . The Cougars have missed the playoffs for three straight seasons and haven’t been out of the playoffs since reaching the Western Conference final in the spring of 2007.

6. The Lethbridge Hurricanes have added Bryan Maxwell to their coaching staff. He will work as an assistant, alongside head coach Drake Berehowsky and fellow assistant Mike Craig. . . . Maxwell, 58, is a veteran WHL coach, having worked in Medicine Hat, Lethbridge and Spokane, but he has been out of the game for a while. . . . He was the WHL’s coach of the year with the Spokane Chiefs for 1991-92. . . . Maxwell was the head coach of the 1986-87 Medicine Hat Tigers, who won the Memorial Cup. . . . He then spent two seasons as an assistant coach with the NHL’s Los Angeles Kings, before taking over as head coach of the Chiefs, a job he held for five seasons. . . . He took over as the Hurricanes’ head coach in 1995-96 and also held the job from 1997-2001 and for 34 games in 2002-03. . . . He sat out the 1996-97 season with a suspension following a post-game altercation involving referee Brent Reiber on March 23, 1996.

7. Ed Habetler, one of the founding fathers of the Prince Albert Raiders, died on the weekend. Habetler, 78, had been battling cancer for some time. . . . According to a Raiders’ news release: “Habetler was on the original board of directors of the hockey club established in 1972 by the Northern Hockey Development Association. . . . Habetler (and) his wife Violet have had season tickets with the hockey club for each of the 43 seasons in club history.” . . . A funeral mass is scheduled for Thursday, 10 a.m., in St. Roman’s Catholic Church in Prince Albert. . . . Almost four years ago, the Prince Albert Daily Herald profiled Habetler right here.

8. The NHL’s Toronto Maple Leafs have named Gord Dineen as head coach of their AHL affiliate, the Toronto Marlies. . . . Dineen takes over from Steve Spott, who has moved up to the Maple Leafs as an assistant coach. . . . Dineen, 51, has been a Marlies’ assistant coach for five seasons. . . . The Leafs also promoted Marlies assistant coach Derek King to associate coach. King, 47, also has been with the Marlies for five seasons.
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Happy to see @TrilightEnt scouting locations in @City_SC today for the Swift Current Broncos movie! Great to have you in Sask! #skfilm
— SMPIA Office (@SMPIAOffice) July 15, 2014

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Stoll buys lunch; Hunt back in coaching game

D Tomáš Kudělka (Lethbridge, 2005-2007) signed 1 yr.plus option contract w/ Pelicans Lahti (Finland, Liiga). (1/2)2/2) Kudělka last season w/ Vitkovice Ostrava (Czech Republic, Extraliga) 47 GP, 1+10.
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1. The long weekend arrived in Kamloops on Thursday at 12:52 p.m. . . . Dorothy and I were at the intersection where the Yellowhead Highway meets Halston. There is a Husky gas station there. As we sat at a red light waiting to turn on to Halston, Dorothy said: “Look. The Husky has two gas prices.” Sure enough. One sign read: $1.32.9. The other read: $1.38.9. . . . “Oh look,” Dorothy said. “The other one is changing.” . . . Hello, Victoria Day long weekend! And, hello, gas at $1.38.9 a litre! But, hey, you knew it was coming. Right? After all, big oil has become as predictable as Christmas in December.

2. Who is Anthony Marquart? Greg Harder of the Regina Leader-Post answers that question right here, as he writes about the man who heads up the group that has purchased the Regina Pats.

3. If you are wondering about the men who purchased the Prince George Cougars, Ted Clarke of the Prince George Citizen will introduce you to them right here.

4. The Saskatoon Blades are in search of a general manager and head coach, and Daniel Nugent-Bowman of the Saskatoon StarPhoenix reports that the process is about to go into the interview stage. That story is right here.

5. A reader of this blog noticed that D Nolan Kneen, who signed with the Kamloops Blazers on Wednesday, played 69 games with the bantam AAA North Shore Winter Club Winterhawks this season. “As a bantam. No time to practise, I guess,” the reader writes. “Fourteen- and 15-year-olds playing 69 games. Holy Hannah! So the Dub has a 72-game sked to get players ‘ready for the NHL’ and bantams are now playing nearly the same amount, I presume, to get them ready for the Dub. Pretty soon, Initiation A players will have 70-game sked to get them ready for Initiation B, etc., etc.” . . . A check of the pre-draft numbers at Small Thoughts at Large shows that Kneen played at least 84 games, what with appearances at the St. Albert tournament, the Western Canadian championship and the U16 B.C. Cup. He turned 15 on March 22.

6. On May 13. 1989, the Swift Current Broncos beat the host Saskatoon Blades 4-3 in overtime to win the Memorial Cup. The championship team’s roster included seven players who had been involved in a bus accident on Dec. 30, 1986, in which four teammates were killed. . . . F Tim Tisdale scored the OT goal in that game. Also on the ice for the GWG were were G Trevor Kruger, D Darren Kruger, D Bob Wilkie, F Kyle Reeves and F Brian Sakic. . . . Brad Brown has chatted with all six players and his report, strictly through the eyes of those who were there, is right here. . . . If you want to read more about how high the mountain was that those Broncos climbed, you may want to take a look at the book Sudden Death: The Incredible Saga of the 1986 Swift Current Broncos.

7. A tip of the hat to F Jarret Stoll of the Los Angeles Kings. Stoll was born in Melville, Sask., but played most of his minor hockey in Yorkton where he helped the bantam AAA Terriers win the 1997 Western Canadian championship. The SJHL’s Yorkton Terriers are in Vernon, B.C., this week, playing in the RBC Cup for the national junior A championship. . . . On Wednesday, Stoll paid for the Terriers’ pregame meal.
On Thursday morning, the Terriers (@Terriers_SJHL) tweeted: “Terriers thank @jarretstoll for his kind gesture yesterday for the boys. Congrats on the win last night Stolly, getter done in Anaheim tmw.”
To which Stoll, who spent four seasons (1998-2002) with the WHL’s Kootenay Ice, responded: “@Terriers_SJHL you’re welcome guys!! Good day for both of us....keep it going! #RBCcup #BecauseitstheCup”

8. By now, you will be aware of what went on with Boston Bruins F Milan Lucic in the handshake line after he and his teammates were eliminated by the visiting Montreal Canadiens on Wednesday night. Jack Todd of the Montreal Gazette has a piece right here in which he points out Lucic wasn’t really being Boston Strong.

9. The championship game at the 2014 Memorial Cup tournament is to be played Sunday, May 25, in London, Ont. When the schedule was announced, a starting time had yet to be determined. That isn’t the case now. The game, according to the tournament’s website, will start at noon Eastern, which is 9 a.m. Pacific.

10. Ian Douglas has been named the fulltime radio voice of the BCHL’s Salmon Arm Silverbacks. Douglas, whose career includes time as the play-by-play man with the BCHL’s Trail Smoke Eaters and the junior B Kamloops Storm and Chase Chiefs, stepped in last season when the Silverbacks found themselves without a radio voice.
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Willie Desjardins, the head coach of the AHL’s Texas Stars, has been added to the roster of speakers for the 2014 Hockey Coaches Conference. Desjardins, a former GM and head coach of the Medicine Hat Tigers, will cover offensive zone play in his presentation. . . . Texas is involved in the AHL playoffs, his Stars and the defending-champion Griffins tied 2-2 in a second-round series that continues tonight in Grand Rapids. . . . The Coaches Conference is scheduled for July 18 and 19 at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver. For more info, click right here or click on the ad at the top of this page.
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The RBC Cup semifinals in Vernon are scheduled for Saturday. In the first game, the SJHL’s Yorkton Terriers will meet the host Vipers, with the MJHL’s Dauphin Kings playing the CCHL’s Carleton Place Canadians in the second game. The first game starts at 2 p.m. Pacific, with the second game at 6 p.m. Unless there is OT in the opener, of course. . . . Dauphin was 3-1 in the round-robin portion of the tournament; the other three qualifiers each was 2-2. . . . The OJHL’s Toronto Lakeshore Patriots went 1-3 and were eliminated.
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D Mathew Berry-Lamontagna, 20, has committed to attending Simon Fraser University and playing for the men’s hockey team there. Berry-Lamontagna (Prince Albert, 2010-12) played this season in the BCHL, splitting it with the Coquitlam Express and Cowichan Valley Capitals. From Vancouver, he had 19 points, six of them goals, in 52 BCHL games this season. . . . He is the first member of SFU’s 2014-15 recruiting class.
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The Vancouver Giants have signed F Dawson Holt of Saskatoon. He was the eighth overall selection in the WHL’s 2014 bantam draft. He had 73 points, 35 of them goals, in 26 games with the bantam AA Saskatoon Generals.
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THE COACHING GAME:
Mario Pouliot is the new head coach of the QMJHL’s Acadie-Bathurst Titan. Pouliot spent the last two seasons as an assistant coach with the QMJHL’s Rouyn-Noranda Huskies. He also has QMJHL head-coaching experience with the Baie-Comeau Drakker (2010-12). . . . He replaces Ron Choules with the Titan. Choules stepped in for Danny Smith when the latter was fired in January. . . . The Titan finished 22-40-6 this season then were swept in a first-round series with the Val-d’Or Foreurs.
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Curtis Hunt is the new general manager and head coach of the AJHL’s Fort McMurray Oil Barons. He replaces Gord Thibodeau, who was fired when this season ended and now is on the staff of the AJHL’s Lloydminster Bobcats. Thibodeau had been with the Oil Barons for 12 seasons. . . . Hunt spent two seasons (2002-04) as head coach of the WHL’s Moose Jaw Warriors and six as head coach of the Regina Pats (2004-08, 2009-11). . . . Hunt was an assistant coach with the NHL’s Ottawa Senators (2008-09) and also worked as the head coach of their AHL affiliate the Binghamton Senators that same season. . . . He has won two gold medals as an assistant coach with Canada’s national junior team (2007, 2008) and has been on the coaching staff with Canada’s national sledge hockey team, helping it to, among other medals. bronze at the 2014 Sochi Paralympic Games.
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MEMORIAL CUP
(at London, Ont., all times Eastern)
(all games televised by Sportsnet)
Friday: Val-d’Or vs. London, 7 p.m.
Saturday: Guelph vs. Edmonton, 4 p.m.
Sunday: London vs. Edmonton, 7 p.m.
Monday: Guelph vs. Val-d’Or, 7 p.m.
Tuesday: Edmonton vs. Val-d’Or, 7 p.m.
Wednesday: London vs. Guelph, 7 p.m.
Thursday: Tiebreaker, if necessary, 7 p.m.
Friday, May 23: Semifinal, 7 p.m.
Saturday, May 24: No game scheduled.
Sunday, May 25: Final, noon.
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 From Jim Parker (@winstarparker): “Expect Oshawa #Generals asst. & former #OHL Windsor #Spitfires captain Paul McFarland to be named Kingston #Frontenacs head coach (Tuesday).”
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From John Duncan (@DuncanOHL): “@winstarparker @vishal_hussain Rumour in Kgn is that Kgn native and former NHLer Jay McKee will be announced on Tues as new FrontHead Coach.”


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Like us and follow us . . .

A Facebook page is up and running in support of the movie based on the book Sudden Death: The Incredible Saga of the 1986 Swift Current Broncos.
If you would like to visit it and “like” it, it’s right here.
You also may want to follow developments via Twitter, and you are able to do that right here.
In both instances, the pages refer to Broncos Movie -- that is in order to separate this project from any other movies or movie projects that might have Sudden Death in their titles.

There has never been a subscription fee for this blog, but if you enjoy stopping by here, why not consider donating to the cause? Just click HERE. . . and thank you very much.

Story about Broncos moves closer to big screen

Sudden Death: The Incredible Saga of the 1986 Swift Current Broncos has moved closer to the big screen.
Shayne Putzlocher, the founder of Trilight Entertainment, a Calgary- and Regina-based production company, said Thursday that “we have been approved for our development financing for the Sudden Death first-draft script.”
That financing has come through Telefilm Canada and the Alberta Media Fund.
Rob King, a veteran writer/director, started working on the first draft of a script on Thursday.
The book tells the story of the 1986-87 Swift Current Broncos, a Western Hockey League team that had four players killed in a bus crash on Dec. 30, 1986. In the spring of 1989, the Broncos won the Memorial Cup. Sudden Death was written by Leesa Culp, who witnessed the accident from the cab of a big rig; former Broncos defenceman Bob Wilkie, who was on the bus and the Memorial Cup team; and Gregg Drinnan, who has written about the WHL and its teams for more than 40 years.
The book was published by Dundurn Press in the fall of 2012 and is available in book stores or through the link on the top right of Taking Note’s home page.
Trilight Entertainment purchased an option on the book shortly after it was published.
Putzlocher, who has been on board from the beginning as the project’s producer, has brought in Rob Merilees as co-producer. Merilees is the founder of Foundation Features, a Vancouver-based production company. Of late, Merilees has been producing Motive, a CTV series that just wrapped its second season. Merilees also has been involved in movies like Capote, Just Friends and The Snow Walker.
Putzlocher approached Merilees, whom he describes as “one of my mentors and a really good friend,” and asked if he would co-produce. Putzlocher felt he needed the help “because of the scope of what this is going to be.”
Putzlocher and Merilees got to work and, as Putzlocher said, “between him and myself we were able to raise all the money we needed for this round of development.
“We got financial participation from Telefilm Canada and the Alberta Media Fund.”
The two producers simply sold Telefilm Canada and the Alberta Media Fund on the hockey team’s story.
“We put a package together and it was just the story of the Swift Current Broncos . . . the story of what the book is,” Putzlocher explained. “People know what the story is . . . it wasn’t trying to sell them anything else other than what the story was.
“It’s not just about people in the west or around the WHL who want to see this film made. Telefilm Canada and the Alberta Media Fund see that this story wants to be told. They realize that this is a great story that deserves to be told.
“I would like to give a huge thank you to Telefilm Canada and the Alberta government, and Minister Klimchuk, for supporting this film.”
Heather Klimchuk is Alberta’s minister of culture and community spirit. She was part of an announcement earlier this month involving a $22.8-million studio and sound stage that is to be built in Alberta before the summer of 2015.
With development financing in place, it’s full speed ahead for Sudden Death.
“The first stage of development,” Putzlocher said, “was to get the option on the book and come up with the concept and treatment of what this story is going to be like.
“The second stage is taking that treatment and actually writing a script.”
That's where King comes in. According to Putzlocher, King is a “big junior hockey fan.”
At one point, not long after the Broncos won the 1989 Memorial Cup, a different production company, including King, was in the early stages of developing the Broncos’ story into a movie. However, that project was derailed with the revelations involving Graham James, the Broncos’ general manager and head coach, who eventually was convicted of sexually abusing players.
“I’ve known Rob King since I started in the industry,” said Putzlocher, who has been in the industry for more than 15 years. “He’s a great guy and a great writer. He’s been a great advocate of the industry in Saskatchewan; he’s been around a very long time.”
Putzlocher isn’t prepared to provide any script or production deadlines. As he said, “It takes quite a while . . . it’s taken a year since we developed it. There have been some delays along the way . . .
“But at the end of the day we’re right where we want to be. We are moving forward.”
He paused and continued . . .
“I can’t give you a timeline of when the first draft will be done . . . or when we’ll go on to the second draft or when we want to shoot this. In a perfect world, I know the 30-year anniversary of the accident is coming up.
“But, at the same time, we have to be realistic.”


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THE MacBETH REPORT:
F Matt Strueby (Regina, 2006-10) signed a contract for this season with the Perth Thunder (Australia, AIHL). He had five goals and seven assists in 16 games with the University of Regina Cougars (CIS) and two goals and four assists in 23 games with the Colorado Eagles (ECHL) this season. The Australia regular season started May 4 and ends Sept. 1.
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A little of this and some of that:
1. The Halifax Mooseheads’ white sweaters are much better for the TV viewer than the ones they wore Saturday.
2. The person whose decision it was to hand out those noisemakers for Sunday’s Memorial Cup game should have his/her pass revoked. Watching on TV, it often sounded as though the building was in the throes of a mosquito infestation.
3. The Sportsnet telecast on Sunday began with an ode to Halifax F Nathan MacKinnon and his three-goal opener. What the talking heads forgot to mention is that MacKinnon was the beneficiary of some leaky goaltending by Mac Carruth of the Portland Winterhawks. Of Halifax’s seven goals in the opener, Carruth likely would want five of them back and three of those were scored by MacKinnon.
4. If Carruth had turned in many efforts like that in the WHL regular season or playoffs, the Winterhawks would have been on the beach long before now. BTW, anyone expecting Portland head coach Travis Green to change goaltending horses in midstream hasn’t been paying attention. . . . And how did Carruth handle things when he met the media on Sunday? He said his club didn’t get the goaltending. Check out this piece right here by Neate Sager of Yahoo! Sports.
5. Let’s thank the Saskatoon Blades for turning this into a tournament. Gee, you mean there’s more to this thing than Drouin, MacKinnon and Jones? . . . The Blades’ 5-2 victory over Halifax on Sunday means that if Portland beats the London Knights tonight, everyone is 1-1 and the fun really begins.
6. Saskatoon G Andrey Makarov won the goaltending battle last night, and the Blades won the game. That’s what can happen when your goaltender plays extremely well. . . . Of course, it helps when you're a bigger and more physical team that scores five times.
7. The Sunday game had its nasty moments. There were at least three really ugly knee-on-knee hits and that’s three too many.
8. The Blades went into Sunday having lost 13 straight postseason games. . . . Saskatoon F Josh Nicholls may be sore today, especially one knee, while F Lukas Sutter is likely going to need treatment on a shoulder.
9. The attendance on Sunday was 8,934, and there are people wondering why the Credit Union Centre, with a capacity of 15,195, isn’t full. Maybe it’s the ticket prices, the game being televised, summer-like weather. Or maybe it is what it is and this is what the major junior tournament is going to draw in Saskatoon. . . . You’ve gotta wonder what it would draw in Spokane or, say, Portland?
10. Alexis Normand is scheduled to sing O Canada prior to Tuesday’s Memorial Cup game. Yes, Normand is the singer who botched the The Star Spangled Banner on Saturday. Kevin Mitchell of the Saskatoon StarPhoenix has a story right here that details how she has dealt with that moment and all that has followed.
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If you are wondering what is happening with the film rights to that book over there on the right — Sudden Death: The Incredible Saga of the 1989 Swift Current Broncos — you’ve come to the right place. . . . Shayne Putzlocher and Holly Baird are in attendance at the Cannes International Film Festival as they work to spread the good word and canvas potential investors. . . . If you’re in Saskatoon at the Memorial Cup, there are copies of the book available at any of the three Coles stores (Midtown Plaza, Sask. Market Mall, Lawson Heights) or the Indigo store in The Centre.
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The AJHL-champion Brooks Bandits beat the host Summerside Western Capitals 3-1 on Sunday to win the RBC Cup, the national junior A championship. . . . This was the first time the Bandits have won the title. . . . F Cam Maclise, a ninth-round selection by the Edmonton Oil Kings in the 2007 WHL bantam draft, had an empty-net goal and an assist for Brooks. He was named the CJHL’s player of the year on Friday. . . . The final game drew a tournament record crowd of 4,211. . . . Brooks was the CJHL’s top-ranked team for the final 22 weeks of the regular season. . . . The Bandits are the first AJHL team to win the title since 2001 when the Camrose Kodiaks did it. . . . The 2014 RBC Cup is scheduled to be held in Vernon, B.C.
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THE COACHING GAME:
Adrian Dater of the Denver Post is reporting that Patrick Roy, the co-owner, general manager and head coach of the QMJHL’s Quebec Remparts, is a “strong candidate” to be the next head coach of the NHL’s Colorado Avalanche. Dater’s report is right here.
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From Neate Sager (@neatebuzzthenet) of Yahoo! Sports): “Watching from the media room again b/c the wireless doesn't work on press row. Great Memorial Cup, Saskatoon.”
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One more from Sager: “This is what the #memorialcup is becoming, host team sits out for weeks, wears down a legitimate skilled team. All about the money, though”
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One more from Sager: “Alright, no more tweets about the Credit Union Centre wifi, kvetching gets old. Saskatoon's made it a tournament. #positives.”
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From Saskatoon Express editor Cam Hutchinson (@camhutchinson): “@neatebuzzthenet Enjoy your stay in our city and may you find a hotspot or a dial up connection ... #didsomebodyshitinyourcornflakes”
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From Matthew Gourlie (@MattGourlie) of the Moose Jaw Times-Herald: “Per twitter former MJ Warrior Jordan Henry is engaged to season 14 Bachelor contestant Jessie Sulidis. Henry is playing in Finland.”


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I have been a sports writer for more than 40 years.
When I write, I’m often making reference to places like Moose Jaw, Spokane, Prince Albert and Lethbridge.
One day last week, I had a conversation with a man who threw out names like Berlin and Cannes. He talked of film festivals. He mentioned TIFF and it wasn’t a picture.
You write a book, someone who makes movies for a living expresses an interest, and you learn there’s a whole other world out there.
As most of you will be aware, the book project with which I was involved – Sudden Death: The Incredible Saga of the 1986
Swift Current Broncos – has been optioned by Trilight Entertainment Inc. The Regina-based production company has plans to turn the book into a feature-length film.
All of this is completely new to me. I will say this book stuff has been an interesting ride and the movie stuff is just an extension of that. At least some of you may be interested in the process and I’m prepared to take you along for the ride.
We’ll start with a conversation I had with Shayne Putzlocher of Trilight Entertainment.
Asked how he came to be in the movie business, Putzlocher, a Regina native, says he has “always just loved it.”
He graduated from high school and was looking for his place in life when he saw an advertisement suggesting some courses that could lead to a career in movies. He took the courses and then “started from the bottom, picking garbage and sitting at the side of the road.”
He really did work his way up the ladder.
Trilight Entertainment, the production company, has been around since 2009. Putzlocher was involved in originating it after working on various productions, including the hit TV show Corner Gas.
Which brings us to Sudden Death: The Incredible Saga of the 1986 Swift Current Broncos.
“The first step,” Putzlocher says, “was securing an option.”
That was done through an agreement with Dundurn, the publishers of the book.
With the option looked after, the process of script development begins.
Putzlocher recalls that this isn’t the first time someone has worked towards bringing this story to the big screen.
Minds Eye Entertainment, another Regina-based production company, worked on a similar project about 20 years ago.
“There was a script . . . they were almost in production,” Putzlocher recalls. “They were financed and everything. Then the scandal hit and – BOOM! – that show went away.”
The scandal, of course, involved Graham James, the general manager and head coach of the Broncos who was charged with sexually abusing players.
Putzlocher said he has had this project in the back of his mind since he first heard that our book was in production. He says he “thought long and hard about” the earlier effort. But he wanted to wait until the book was out and he had read it before forming an opinion.
Leesa Culp, the main push behind the book project, made sure Putzlocher got a copy. He was in production on a children’s movie, Step Dogs, at the time, but found time to read Sudden Death over the Christmas holiday.
“There is obviously a story here,” Putzlocher says, “but how it gets told was how I had to look at it.”
That’s what was going through his mind as he read the book.
His vision is to “concentrate on the triumphs over adversity, and the team and the camaraderie, and people in the town, and what it did in those moments of the funeral and making the playoffs that year and everything like that.”
In other words, this won’t be a movie about Graham James.
The shaping of that story already has begun. Putzlocher talked to his business partner, Holly Baird, and the decision was made to find “a real good feature film writer.”
They found that person in Rob King, who had been involved in the Minds Eye project “so was very excited to do this.”
Already King is working to prepare what Putzlocher says will be “a 10- to 20-page treatment to say what the story actually is going to be about.”
“We knew this is a story we really want to tell so it’s worth investing in,” Putzlocher continues. “We’ll wait for him to do that. It’ll probably take him a good month or so to come back with a 10- to 20-page treatment . . . then after that, if we like the way he’s going, we might tweak a few things, then it’s ‘OK you can start writing a script.’ ”
If things fall into place, a script could be completed by year’s end, at which time they will begin to research the project, do a whole lot of fact checking, look after waivers . . . and on and on.
“It’s a lot of money in legal and it’s a lot of work,” Putzlocher says. “We’ll take our time with this whole thing and we’ll make sure it’s done right.”
While all of this is going on, Putzlocher and Baird will be starting the hunt for financing. It is going to cost big money to bring this story to the big screen, simply because it is a ‘period’ piece. No, not ‘period’ in the sense of, say, Downton Abbey. But the incident around which Sudden Death is based occurred on Dec. 30, 1986, meaning cars and clothes, just for starters, were rather different than what we see on the streets and on people today.
“Uniforms, clearances, buses, extras . . . this is an expensive movie and you have to try to do it right,” Putzlocher says, adding that he’s talking about as much as $7 million. “Trying to raise that money in Canada isn’t impossible, but we will need public money from Canada on board and foreign sales.”
There are various grants and some development money available, and the process of applying for those has begun.
Putzlocher will be in Berlin later this week for the Berlin Film Festival that runs from Thursday through Feb. 17.
In brief, here’s what will be happening . . .
In Berlin, the pitch will begin to sales people to “see if we can generate some interest just on concept.”
The Cannes Film Festival runs May 15-26 and Putzlocher will be there, too. By then, he says, there’ll be a foreign sales agent on board and that person will “start trying to sell concept.”
The Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) is scheduled for Sept. 5-15. By TIFF, he says, “we’d like to have some really good treatment and start going to Canadian distributors.”
In 2014, Trilight Entertanment will make the rounds again, this time with a script.
“And,” Putzlocher says, “we’ll start looking at cast, who’s going to be our director . . . we want a really high-profile director.”
This whole project, really, is about the art of selling. And were this simply a Canadian hockey movie, it wouldn’t have much of a chance. Putzlocher sees this as a whole lot more than that.
“Internationally,” he says, “hockey movies don’t sell that well. Just because we’re from Canada doesn’t mean everybody loves hockey. But this is more than just a hockey movie. . . . and we have to think of the international market.”
They also have to think about a theatrical distributor, and there are hopes that CBC will “take the TV rights after it goes theatrical.”
So what does all this mean?
If all goes well, if everything falls into place, Sudden Death: The Incredible Saga of the 1986 Swift Current Broncos could be coming to a theatre near you in November or December of 2015.
Now that would make for a Merry Christmas!

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Trilight Entertainment Inc. has optioned Sudden Death: The Incredible Saga of the 1986 Swift Current Broncos and has already begun the process of making a feature film based on the book that was released in November.
For more information, click right here and read the press release that Trilight Entertainment and Dundburn issued this morning.

There has never been a subscription fee for this blog, but if you enjoy stopping by here, why not consider donating to the cause? Just click HERE. . . and thank you very much.