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The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Chiefs, Babcock Feeling The Draft Season Abruptly Cut Short, Whl Coach Has Work Ahead

Dan Weaver Staff Writer

Hockey season is over, but for Mike Babcock the work goes on.

The coach of the Spokane Chiefs - his season short-circuited by an official’s mistake in Tri-City last week - has another week to prepare for the April 27 Western Hockey League bantam draft.

Babcock goes back out on the road this week to check out the available talent. He’ll take in a weekend tournament in Edmonton in between conducting fitness tests in Edmonton, Saskatoon and Calgary.

The Chiefs use the tests to determine the makeup of summer workout programs for players and listed prospects.

Adding to the organized confusion is this week’s move out of the Chiefs’ Coliseum offices. The club has taken up temporary residence in the Park Center Building on Howard, across the street from the Arena.

The Chiefs have six picks in the first three rounds in the bantam draft of players born in 1980, an inviting prospect to an organization that is by any account rock-solid.

Twenty of 23 players are eligible to return next year when the Chiefs move into new 10,500-seat Veterans Memorial Arena.

Spokane loses only its 20-year-olds - captain Kevin Sawyer, goaltender Jarrod Daniel and right wing Jeremy Stasiuk.

Sawyer, the property of the NHL St. Louis Blues, left Monday night for Peoria, Ill., where he expects to join the Peoria Rivermen, the Blues’ club in the International Hockey League.

Daniel hopes to sign with an NHL organization within the next two weeks, Babcock said.

Stasiuk, drafted by the NHL Dallas Stars, remains unsigned but is hopeful of landing a pro contract.

They leave behind a contender. Spokane had the Tri-City Americans on the run in the WHL West Division semifinals when its overtime goal in the deciding game of the series was disallowed.

Replays showed the shot by Sean Gillam rebounded off a Tri-City player and was not directed in by a Chiefs skate. It should have stood as the series winner.

“That was an awful way to end it,” Babcock said. “Watching the replay makes it even worse. The guys are asking themselves, ‘How you can win and not advance?”’

Although the incident begs for televised replay in game-deciding situations, Chiefs general manager Tim Speltz says fans shouldn’t look for it any time soon.

“With financial and building restraints, the technology is not readily available for everyone in our league,” Speltz said. “It hasn’t been totally successful in the NHL with all their technology.”

The Chiefs will lose one player to the new Calgary Hitmen in the May 25 WHL expansion draft. They can protect next season’s 20 year-olds - Dmitri Leonov and Scott Fletcher - plus 11 players in next year’s 17- to 19-year-old group. Players born in 1979 are not subject to the draft.

When Babcock calls the Chiefs back together on Aug. 24 for training camp, he’ll welcome a seasoned team and some impressive new talent.

The top newcomer is Derek Schutz, who played two games with the Chiefs in Regina and Moose Jaw.

“Schutz has an opportunity to step in and play a role with us,” Babcock said. “He’s a 6-3 right-handed centerman who assisted on the gamewinning goal on the Saskatchewan team that won the gold medal in the Canada winter games.”

Defensemen Curtis Suitor, Brad Ference and Chris Lane have a chance to wind up among the chosen two dozen but playing time will be hard to come by. The Chiefs will probably get all of their blue-line players back including WHL secondteam all-star Sean Gillam, who last summer spent time in camp with the Detroit Red Wings.

It’s possible, but not likely, that the Chiefs could lose scoring leader Jason Podollan to the NHL Florida Panthers. Podollan, 19, is talking contract terms with the Panthers, who could sign him and place him with their IHL team in Cincinnati for the remainder of the season.

Podollan would return to Spokane if he doesn’t stick with the Panthers.

Although loaded with depth, next year’s Chiefs face some transition.

Sawyer’s role as enforcer and leader will be difficult to fill.

Daniel was a gem of a goaltender, but there is a replacement.

“Will give it to David Lemanowicz and see how far he takes it,” Babcock said. “He’s probably the hardestworking player I’ve ever coached, office. He spent a lot of time on the weights and on the (excercise) bike this year.”

The backup job in goal will probably go to one of three new people - Rick Sobry, 18, Aaron Miller, 17 and Wayne Renaud, 16. Miller was in goal for the Canada Games-winning Saskatchewan team.

“If there’s a guy with the inside track, he (Miller) probably has it,” Babcock said, “but with the expansion draft, who knows who’s going to be taken?”

The Chiefs have to subject their listed as well as unprotected rostered players to the expansion draft.

Babcock, who turns 32 this month, said the club’s most improved players were probably forwards John Cirjak and Joe Cardarelli.

Cardarelli, benched briefly at midseason for not working hard enough, became lethal on the power play. Cirjak - who came to Spokane with Cardarelli from Burnaby, British Columbia - developed a knack for scoring game-winners.

Cirjak and Cardarelli are part of a bumper crop of 17-year-olds with Greg Leeb, Trent Whitfield, Hugh Hamilton and Joel Boschman.

“Leeb and Whitfield had their best games in the playoffs,” the coach added, “and Hamilton was our best player in the first round of the playoffs.”

They are now part of the core of veterans who - if healthy - should challenge for the championship of a tough division.

It’s a team that can play physical with Darren Sinclair, Jay Bertsch, Boschman, Scott Fletcher, Mike Haley, Ryan Berry and Randy Favaro.

Leeb, Whitfield, Podollan, Jared Hope and Leonov give it quickness. Cirjak and Cardarelli are two of a dozen forwards with scoring talent. Schutz - the most talked-about young talent to come in since Pat Falloon - should fit in nicely.

Gillam, Hamilton, Adam Magarrell and John Shockey with Boschman and Fletcher are experienced blue-liners.

With a new building opening, with a proven coaching staff, veterans who can win and an enviable drafting position, the Chiefs are loaded with promise - present and future.