Vets step up in Red-White game
A couple of veteran players looking to stay with the Spokane Chiefs finished off their training camps in style on Sunday.
One of them, Mike Senseman had two goals and an assist as Team Red defeated Team White, 7-3, before a Red-White game record crowd of 1,611 at the Arena. The other, defenseman Gustav Engman, started the scoring in the free-flowing game to finish off a stellar camp.
Each player is in a position where they need to prove their worth to management before final cutdowns are made between now and the team’s season opener on Sept. 24.
Senseman, an 18-year-old right winger, bounced between the Chiefs and the Junior B Spokane Braves for most of last season. So, he worked hard in the off-season and had a solid camp in an effort to earn a spot – and stay – with the Chiefs.
“I just want to work off of what I was doing last year,” said Senseman, a Vancouver, Wash., product. “It felt good. It was a summer’s worth of hard work and I just have to keep it going through exhibition and show the coaches what I can do.”
Engman, one of three Chiefs’ 20-year-olds, is also one of three European players on the team’s roster. Each Western Hockey League team is allowed to keep only two “imports” once the season starts. The Chiefs are allowed to carry three at this point in the season (since one of them is a 20-year-old), but still can only play two per game.
So, Engman could end up as the odd man out in a trio that includes forwards Michael Grabner and Johannes Salmonsson, the team’s 2005 Euro Draft first-round pick.
Salmonsson, a 2004 second-round pick of the National Hockey League’s Pittsburgh Penguins, will leave for NHL camp on Sept. 11, one of six Chiefs headed to NHL camps. In the meantime, Engman is certainly making things a close call.
“I thought ‘Goose’ was very outstanding, all the way through camp, and the other two guys are skilled, too,” said coach Bill Peters after the game. “That will be a situation that won’t settle itself out until right to the bitter end.”
In Sunday’s scrimmage, six different players scored goals as Team Red scored three goals in second and third periods for the easy win. Rookie Gavin Millan, 17, also had a goal and an assist for Team Red. Also finding the net for Team Red were Salmonsson, Myles Stoesz, and Spokane native Evan Witt.
Team White got two of its goals from a pair of impressive rookies and the third from veteran Mike Reich.
Drayson Bowman, Spokane’s 16-year-old, first-round selection in the 2004 Bantam draft, had a third-period goal in which he took a pass at the blue line, spun toward the net, and got past three defenseman to beat veteran goalie Jim Watt top shelf.
The other nifty goal came from Derek Lee, 15, who isn’t eligible to make the roster this year. He was one of seven Spokane 15-year-olds to play in the game.
The Chiefs played six goaltenders in the game and will take four with them into the preseason: veterans Watt and Kevin Opsahl, along with rookies Thomas Stehr, 17, and Darcy Keumper, 15.
Peters liked what he saw during camp.
“It’s good to have a good look at some of the young guys and everybody that’s in our system and our 50-man (protected player) list,” he said, “(but) it’s definitely good to get through this part of the process.
“We need to get some structure and team play into the system. As a coach, it’s difficult to watch. They need to realize that it’s no longer summer hockey out there.”
The Chiefs will carry 31 or 32 players, including three 15-year-olds, as they participate in their first full practices on Tuesday through Thursday of this week in the Arena. Spokane then travels to Everett on Friday for the first of three games in the Silvertips’ preseason tournament.