New arena for Nanaimo? . . . Dillabaugh, Mast in demand? . . . Americans win another title

thank you so much everyone who helped and came out this weekend!! It means the world to us to see you out there!

— RD memorial (@RDMtournament) June 15, 2015

Most Fun I've Had In A Long Time, Thank You @RDMtournament Great Event And Better Cause 👍 @kellanlavallee @QuailLeroux78 @AaronMarkin

— Eric Callegari (@EricCallegari) June 15, 2015

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F Ryan Harrison (Prince Albert, Medicine Hat, Everett, 2007-13) signed a one-year contract with Olofström (Sweden, Division 2). This season, with the University of Calgary (CIS), he had three goals and 14 assists in 23 games. . . .
F Brennan Bosch (Medicine Hat, 2005-09) signed a one-year contract with Harzer Falken Braunlage (Germany, Oberliga). This season, Bosch captained the University of Saskatchewan Huskies (CIS). He had nine goals and 16 assists in 28 games. . . .
F Kevin Undershute (Medicine Hat, Portland, 2004-08) signed a one-year contract with Harzer Falken Braunlage (Germany, Oberliga). This season, with the Eston Ramblers (Sask Valley Hockey League), he had 53 points, 21 of them goals, in 21 games. He led the Ramblers in scoring and was sixth in the league. . . .
D Bohdan Višňák (Saskatoon, 2006-07) signed a one-year extension with Nice (France, Division 1). This season, he had one goal and eight assists in 24 games.
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Ever since the Chilliwack Bruins scurried across the Strait of Georgia to Victoria during the summer of 2011 and were re-born as the Royals, the WHL has yearned for a second team on Vancouver Island.
The natural choice is Nanaimo. The problem, of course, is that there isn’t an arena there that meets WHL requirements.
However, it seems there is a move afoot to build a new arena in Nanaimo.
Brian Martin, who owns the Howard Johnson Hotel and approximately eight acres of land there, is wanting to build a sports and entertainment complex in downtown Nanaimo. The total cost would be somewhere around $80 million.
The project would include a 5,000-seat arena.
Spencer Anderson of the Nanaimo Daily News has more right here.
Once a shovel goes into the ground on a new arena, the lineup to own the Nanaimo WHL franchise will form on the right.
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There also is a report that Surrey, B.C., wants to get involved in a public-private partnership that would result in a new arena next to the Scott Road SkyTrain Station. . . . Were that arena to be built to WHL standards, you are free to wonder whether the Vancouver Giants would be interested in moving from the aged Pacific Coliseum. . . . Michael Mui of 24 Hours Vancouver has more on a possible new arena right here.
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Elliotte Friedman of Hockey Night in Canada filed his latest 30 Thoughts on Sunday. This one includes mention of Kim Dillabaugh, who had a good run as the Kelowna Rockets’ goaltending coach, and Lyle Mast, the Tri-City Americans’ goaltending coach. . . . 30 Thoughts is right here.
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If the Tampa Bay Lightning is to win the Stanley Cup, it will have to go seven games to do it. If that happens, Stacy Roest would become the eighth former Medicine Hat Tigers player with at least one Stanley Cup ring. Roest, 40, is the Lightning’s director of player development. . . . There’s more right here. . . . With the AHL having been decided on Saturday night and the ECHL last night, the NHL is the last one standing. Of course, the Chicago Blackhawks can end it in Game 6 at home tonight.
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In the ECHL, the host Allen Americans scored two first-period goals 1:16 apart and went on to a 6-1 victory over the South Carolina Stingrays in Game 7 of the Kelly Cup final. . . . The Americans have won a championship each of the past three seasons. They won the last two Central league titles before the league was absorbed by the ECHL. . . . F Chad Costello (10:31) and F Vincent Arseneau (11:47) got the Americans off to a 2-0 lead and they never looked back. . . . The Americans’ lineup includes F Spencer Asuchak (Tri-City, Prince George, 2008-12) and F Dyson Stevenson (Regina, 2010-14). . . . Asuchak had 21 points, including 11 goals, in 25 playoff games, while Stevenson had eight points, three of them goals, in 23 games. . . . Attendance last night was 6,125. . . . The game sheet is right here. . . . Ryan Gerbosi of the Dallas Morning News has a gamer right here.
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Congrats to pal Mike Stothers on leading his @MonarchsHockey to the Calder Cup Championship! #jobwelldone #waytogoGoldie

— Don Nachbaur (@HCChiefs42) June 14, 2015

Congrats to my old liney Steve Martinson who directed his @AllenAmericans to the Kelly Cup. Special congrats to @Asuchak16

— Don Nachbaur (@HCChiefs42) June 15, 2015

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THE MacBETH REPORT:
F Brad Voth (Medicine Hat, 1996-2002) signed a one-year contract extension with the Cardiff Devils (Wales, UK Elite). He had 22 goals and 16 assists in 50 games for the Devils last season. This will be Voth's seventh season in Cardiff. . . .
F Jade Galbraith (Saskatoon, 2001-02) signed a one-year contract with the Braehead Clan (Scotland, UK Elite). He had 28 goals and led the league with 65 assists in 58 games for the Nottingham Panthers (England, UK Elite) last season. . . .
F Derek LeBlanc (Brandon, Calgary, 2003-07) signed a one-year contract with the Belfast Giants (Northern Ireland, UK Elite). He had 25 goals and 25 assists in 66 games with the Rapid City Rush (Central Hockey League) last season.
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Bob Tory, the general manager of the Tri-City Americans, certainly isn’t on a summer vacation.
Tory completed his second major trade in two days Friday, this time acquiring D Mitch Topping, 18, from the Victoria Royals.
In exchange, the Americans gave up F Justin Spagrud, 16, and a second-round selection in the 2013 bantam draft.
The 6-foot-1, 185-pound Topping, who is from Red Deer, played the last two seasons with the Chilliwack Bruins, who relocated to Victoria following the 2010-11 season.

Former Chilliwack defenceman Mitch Topping now is a
member of the Tri-City Americans.

The eighth overall selection in the 2008 bantam draft, Topping had 16 points in 71 games last season, following a 13-point freshman season.
Topping becomes the sixth experienced defenceman on Tri-City’s roster along with Sam Grist and Zach Yuen, both 18, Drydn Dow, 19, and Matt MacKenzie and Brock Sutherland, both 20.
It is doubtful that both MacKenzie and Sutherland will spend the season with the Americans, who have five 20-year-olds on their roster.
They had six before dealing G Drew Owsley to the Prince George Cougars on Thursday. The Americans got back G Ty Rimmer, 19, in that exchange. The Americans also gave up a conditional seventh-round pick in the 2013 draft, while picking up a third-rounder in 2012 and a fifth in 2013.
Spagrud was a third-round pick by the Americans in the 2010 bantam draft. He is from Gull Lake, Sask., the hometown of Roger Aldag, the great Saskatchewan Roughriders offensive lineman who is in the Canadian Football Hall of Fame.
Spagrud had 16 points, including nine goals, in 36 games with the midget AAA Swift Current Legionnaires last season. He also played for Saskatchewan at the 2011 Canada Winter Games in Halifax in February.
In his draft season, Spagrud put up 62 points, 35 of them goals, in 26 games with the bantam AA Swift Current Kabos Raiders.
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If you’re a WHL fan, or just a hockey fan, you are going to want to come out and watch the Everett Silvertips when they are in your town in the approaching season.
Why?
Because of defenceman Ryan Murray.
Jim Matheson of the Edmonton Journal has a look at Murray right here.
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Corey Carlson, who played on the Vernon Lakers when they won the 1989 BCHL championship, was killed last weekend when two small planes collided in mid-air north of Anchorage. Carlson’s wife and two young daughters also died.
Roger Knox of the Vernon Morning Star has more right here.
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Gotta think that the commissioners of major junior hockey’s three leagues about choked on their morning cereal when they read a piece by the afore-mentioned Jim Matheson of the Edmonton Journal on Dougie and Freddie Hamilton, who are hoping to become only the second set of brothers ever to play together on Canada’s national junior team.
Included in Matheson’s piece is this gem:
Dougie said he didn’t study much during IceDogs’ road bus trips in the Ontario Hockey League circuit.
“A lot of people say players bring their laptops and binders on the bus to do school work, but I’ve never seen it. I think that’s what the league says to convince the people to come.
“I try to get it done before, so I don’t have to worry about it,” said Dougie. “I just do my best and those are the marks I get. In school, I’m there to work and learn. Same as the rinks.”
Read the entire story right here.
Gotta think Paul Kelly of College Hockey Inc. has hit cut, paste and send a few times on that one.
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THE COACHING GAME:
Mark LeRose, who did a stint as an assistant coach with the Everett Silvertips, has joined the coach staff of EC Red Bull Salzburg, which plays in the Austrian elite league. LeRose, 41, will work with Red Bull Salzburg, which has Pierre Page as its head coach, and with the U-20 club. . . .
Lyle Mast is the new goaltending coach with the Tri-City Americans. Mast, who has coached goaltending for more than 25 years, spent the last two seasons working with the Edmonton Oil Kings, and had worked with the U of Alberta Golden Bears since 2007. He is the owner of Optimum Reaction Sports, a goaltender training company that researches and develops programs through biomechanics related to the position. . . . Former WHL/NHL goaltender Olaf Kolzig, who owns part of the Americans, worked with the goaltenders last season but now is working with the NHL’s Washington Capitals, thus the need for another coach in Kennewick. . . .
Derek Lalonde is the new head coach of the USHL’s Green Bay Gamblers. He spent the last five seasons as an assistant coach with the U of Denver Pioneers. he takes over from Eric Rud, who now is an assistant coach with the Colorado College Tigers.

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