Head coach feels Blazers headed in right direction

By GREGG DRINNAN
Daily News Sports Editor
Guy Charron, the head coach of the Kamloops Blazers, liked what he saw of his troops in Saturday’s regular-season finale.
The Blazers lost that game, 6-5 in a shootout, to the host Vancouver Giants. But it came one night after the Blazers were badly beaten, 5-1, by the Prince George Cougars, a non-playoff team that won only its fourth road game of the season.
The Blazers and Giants will open a best-of-seven first-round WHL playoff series with games in Vancouver on Friday and Saturday nights.
“The team regrouped,” Charron explained. “What I admire about the group of kids we have is that you can look at what has happened since I’ve been here, and we haven’t put up winning streaks, but we haven’t gone into a losing streak either.
“I really had confidence in the kids that they were going to respond against Vancouver. That is an indication of how our team is going in the right direction.”
Since Charron joined the team on Nov. 23, the Blazers haven’t lost more than two games in a row. They had one five-game winning streak and on two other occasions put together back-to-back victories.
Overall, they were 21-20-0-4 under Charron.
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The Blazers acquired G Kurtis Mucha, 20, from the Portland Winter Hawks for a fourth-round draft pick on Nov. 22.
And you know the Blazers are thrilled with that exchange.
Mucha, meanwhile, feels that he is having the best season of his five-year WHL career.
“I thought it was probably my best regular season,” he said earlier this week. “I look back on Portland and I thought I had a pretty good stretch there. My numbers were pretty good; my save percentage was over .900.
“The trade happened and I was kind of up and down when I first got here. But after Christmas, up until mid-February, I thought I played really well . . . probably the most consistent of my career.”
He admitted he hit a “rough patch” late in February, but feels he has things back under control. He was quite pleased with the way he played Saturday when the Blazers were beaten 6-5 in a shootout by the host Giants.
“Overall, I thought it was probably my best, most consistent season,” he said. “And that’s what you want when you’re 20 — you have to be an impact player on your team.”
He didn’t even mind being credited with 50 saves — other members of the Blazers feel that figure by the Vancouver shot counters was inflated — because it allowed him to finish with a .900 save percentage for the season.
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Here’s Charron, on what he feels is the key to success:
“Our back end is very important to our success. I really think when we have success . . . if those two areas (goaltending and defence) play well we have a great opportunity to be successful.”
But he doesn’t dwell on things like that when he is preparing his players.
“I’ve said to the kids, ‘It doesn’t matter about the outcome. The important thing is that we give it our best.’ ”
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It’s is doubtful that F Lance Bouma, the Giants’ captain, will be ready for Friday’s game. But the Giants are hopeful he will return at some point in the series.
Bouma, who suffered a knee injury on Feb. 13, returned to practice Tuesday, albeit wearing a yellow no-contact jersey.
“That’s a huge loss for them,” Mucha said. “He’s not going to put up 20 points in a series but he’s a character guy and he really gets them going and he intimidates some of our guys.
“But they’re still a strong team and they’ve done all right without him.”
Bouma missed the Giants’ last 14 games. Without him, they went 7-5-2-0.
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JUST NOTES: Bonner won’t be at Friday’s game in Vancouver. Instead, he’ll be in Eston, Sask., watching the Kindersley Klippers open an SJHL semifinal against the Yorkton Terriers. Kindersley G Josh Thorimbert, a third-round pick by the Blazers in the 2007 bantam draft, is having a terrific season with the Klippers. He has yet to commit to Kamloops. . . . The Klippers have played in Eston since Jan. 8 when a fire damaged the arena in Kindersley. . . . The Blazers have cut lines into their hair, just above the ears. They plan on adding one line for each playoff series won, just as the 1992 Memorial Cup-winning team did. Bonner and Kamloops assistant coach Scott Ferguson were on that team.
gdrinnan@kamloopsnews.ca
gdrinnan.blogspot.com