Last spring, it was the Belleville Bulls who eliminated the Wolves in six games, en route to the Eastern Conference finals, a series that turned out to be much closer than most OHL observers had predicted. This time around, it’s the powerhouse Barrie Colts that lie in waiting — a team that has been fine-tuned for a run at the Memorial Cup, adding key components at various points this season.
Now, two years removed from finishing dead last in the Ontario Hockey League, a placement that earned them the right to select smooth skating forward John McFarland with the first overall pick, the local juniors should have been well on their way to nearing their peak in the cycle.
A jump up to the post-season in 2008-09 provided some signs for optimism, as the likes of Eric O’Dell, John Kurtz, Daniel Maggio, Jared Staal, Andrew Loverock, Jake Cardwell and McFarland, all returned with OHL seasoning behind them.
The Sudbury Wolves entered the 2009-2010 campaign, in the eyes of many junior hockey pundits, as one of a handful of teams who would likely battle it out for the middle of the pack home ice advantage that comes with nabbing fourth place in the East (vs finishing fifth, sixth or lower).
It was an assessment that I both agreed with at the time and still do to this day. But a slow start, conspired with a series of other setbacks, caused the Wolves to literally fight for their playoff lives as the OHL season concluded last weekend.
A 4-8-0-1 start spelled the end of the line for newly-anointed head coach Bryan Verreault, and while the team showed improvement under Mike Foligno (Verreault - .346; Foligno - .455), the squad never seemed to reach its full potential on a consistent basis.
True, some key injuries to the likes of Loverock and Cardwell certainly did not help matters. But more to the point were some issues that appear to be problematic in Wolves Country.
Costly penalties resurfaced once again this year as Sudbury finished second only to the Barrie Colts in terms of power play opportunities allowed. The Wolves surrendered almost 60 more chances than the league average, essentially giving away an additional 12 goals to their opponents (assuming an average power play success rate of roughly 20 per cent).
A slow start, conspired with a series of other setbacks, caused the Wolves to literally fight for their playoff lives.
The team was also plagued by defensive miscues across the board — not just the defense corps — making the types of little mistakes that hurt big time against better teams. Only the defensively woeful Oshawa Generals and the Peterborough Petes allowed more goals against in the East than did the residents of the Elgin Street barn.
All of which adds up to a matchup against a team that virtually doubled the Wolves total point output this season (116 to 59).
In each and every year that coach Foligno has taken his team to the post-season — six of the seven years he has been at the helm of the Wolves — the squad has played considerably better than in the regular season.
Over the past seven years, the Wolves have never finished higher than fifth in the East. Fortunately for Sudbury faithful, coach Foligno appears to revel in the role as underdog, leveraging the motivation in registering no less than five upsets of higher seeded playoff opponents in his tenure as coach of the Wolves Foligno manages, somehow, to get his team to play its very best hockey when it matters the most. Given that his team will be looking across the ice at a crew that has beaten the Wolves in seven of their eight meetings this year, Foligno and company will need to be at their absolute best.
Randy Pascal is the voice of Eastlink Sports and the founder of SudburySports.com.
