BCHP Livewire

Now that the Chetwynd Chiefs are coasting in toward their 3rd Joe McGrath Championship, speculation has begun as to whether they are a BCHP dynasty. With only six games to play in the 6th complete BCHP season, it now seems certain that the Chiefs will win again. Craig Jones, General Manager of the Chiefs, refuses to weigh in on the subject. “We are not celebrating anything yet; we’ve got some games to play out and there are teams in mathematical contention.”

As of this morning, the Bella Coola Thunderbirds were a distant 68 points in the Chiefs’ rearview mirror. With that kind of spread, the ‘birds would need more than a point a game from their players for the remainder of the season, while the Chiefs could score no more points. Unlikely, at best.

And in the Chiefs room, the tone is jubulant. “It feels good. We came into the season focused on one thing - to win a third title for this franchise - and we are going to accomplish that. Nothing can stop that now,” beamed Jason Spezza. Martin St.Louis, brought in from the X-Men organization part way throught the season, played a huge part in the success of the team, and seemed just as happy. “We haven’t popped the champagne, but it’s in the fridge.” For Lubomir Visnovsky, part of the #1 defensive unit in the BCHP, it looks like the weight is off the shoulders, “We repeated, it feels very, very good.”

But are the Chiefs a dynasty? Winning 50% of the Joe McGraths awarded certainly helps make the case, but from his palatial office in Barkerville Craig Engleson feels it’s too soon to call anyone in the BCHP a dynasty. “We have had only three winners in our league this far, Barkerville, Tumbler Ridge and Chetwyn. I think that having the Goldpanners win two cups casts some shadows onto this whole Chiefs dynasty talk.”

Dynasty or not, the party is starting in Chetwyn.

Wow, what has become of the Burns Lake X-Men recently. Last month this team was the absolute power in the league, and this month they are way down at rock bottom. So what gives? Is this team for real, or are they now finally showing their true colors.

Right in the middle of the most exciting race the young organization has ever been in involved in, the Bella Coola Thunderbirds have made an announcement about the recently vacated captaincy. Brendan Morrow was released by the team, leaving the spot open. Curt Fraser held court at Mountain Burger House yesterday afternoon, flanked by three new on-ice leaders. The Thunderbirds have announced that for the remainder of the season they will rotate the captaincy between three players, Evgeni Malkin, Dany Heatley, and Wade Redden. Fraser said, “With Brendan gone now we had a hole that needed to be filled and we had a few guys we thought could step up. In the end the players wanted to rotate the job around, partly in respect for Brendan, and partly because they thought it would be good to get a look at different guys in the role. We’ll go this way for the remainder of the season, and in to the playoffs.”

BellaCoola’s BCHP franchise, the Thunderbirds are fishing for second place in the standings this week, and appear to be reeling in the Steelheaders. The Bellacoola Thunderbirds recorded a shoutout victory yesterday evening, leaving Roberto Luongo and his teammates only two points back of Houston. Fans in BellaCoola have bought standing room tickets for each of the T-bird five remaining home games. The sophomore franchise has never been in a hunt like this, as the entire valley has caught T-bird fever from Hagensbourg to Bella Bella.

Brendan Morrow, the injured captain of the Bella Coola Thunderbirds, has been released by the organization in a surprising move by the new management team. Recently, Blake Defieux was raked over the coals in the media for the release of Ray Whitney during the Thunderbirds rookie campaign. Perhaps this is history repeating itself.

Speaking on behalf of the Bella Coola organization, Head Coach Curt Fraser and Director of Hockey operations George Armstrong fielded questions in Bella Coola. Fraser had this to say about the release of the captain. “Brendan’s service to our organization has been amazing. He is a dedicated pro athlete. It was tough for us to let him go, but we made some changes yesterday and the cap is a hard reality in the BCHP. We hope Brendan is picked-up by another team in the the coming off-season; he deserves to be in the league.”

George Armstrong added, “Despite the tough loss of our former captain, we feel the Thunderbirds are a stonger team today than they have ever been before.”

In the minutes before the trade deadline, there was a flurry of action in the BCHP.

Perhaps the team make that made the most wholesale change was the Barkerville Goldpanners. The ‘panners made trades with two teams. First the ‘panners moved Jay Bouwmeester and Wojtek Wolski to the Bella Coola Thunderbirds for Alex Tanguay and Ryan Suter. The ‘panners then promtly turned around and dealt Ryan Suter, Jeff Carter, Steve Bernier, the Bison 3rd in 2007, and the ‘panner #1 in 2008 to the Burns Lake X-Men for Pavel Datsyuk. So, the ‘panners add two big guns to their offense, and will have to dig deep into thier pocketbooks to keep the current squad intact for the 2007-2008 season.

The Tumbler Ridge Typhoon continued their restructuring in a big way, saying goodbye to Dany Heatley. In return for Healtey, the Typhoon brought in Anze Kopitar and Niklas Backstrom from the Thunderbird organization. The Typhoon have added some great young talent, look to be a re-emerging threat in the BCHP, and likely will be in a buying position over the off-season or on draft-day.