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Some Guelph Storm veterans in tough to make the team

Some experienced players are on the bubble heading into the exhibition games
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Saxon on the Storm

The purpose of a training camp is supposed to be seeing who makes the team. This year's Guelph Storm training camp is just as much about who doesn't make it.

Even with the release of two players and the trading of captain C.J. Garcia off last year's squad in the off season, there were already more signed players than spots on this year's team before the first blade hit the ice.

People were coming in to camp trying not to lose their jobs as much as they were win them.

Let's do the math.

A team dresses 20 players. Rarely do they keep more than two extras. That makes 22 roster spots. Normal breakdown would be 13 forwards, seven defencemen and two goalies.

Guelph came in to camp with 13 returning forwards (I'm including Cedric Ralph and Nate Schnarr), added import Albert Michnac then signed draft picks Luke Moncada and Barret Kirwin.

Even if Kirwin splits time between Guelph and a lower league, that still leaves two forwards too many, given that Moncada seems destined to stick.

Evan Brown, a highly regarded former third round pick who missed almost two years with concussion issues, is also going to be given every opportunity to make the team.

That means a few returning players are going to have to prove they deserve to stay.

You don't have to be Scott Bowman to figure out those players would be 18 and 19 year olds who played primarily third and fourth line roles a year ago, namely Brock Philips and Kyle West. Perhaps one more.

Unless you are a contending team, fourth line minutes are there to develop young players, not to keep around good guys who can't move up the depth chart.

The team could also look to move an underperforming player in a trade to open up playing time for their youngsters.

On defence they have eight signed defencemen, and that includes Russian Dmitri Somorukov, who is being held up in Russia by paperwork issues.

Someone's got to go.

Barring injury, it could come down to 17-year-old Quinn Hanna needing to prove he belongs after a year spent largely in junior B. If he does, a trade would be made to open up room for him.

So while the coaches do have some decisions to make, it will be some veteran players themselves that determine their own fate by their play in the exhibition season.


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Tony Saxon

About the Author: Tony Saxon

Tony Saxon has had a rich and varied 30 year career as a journalist, an award winning correspondent, columnist, reporter, feature writer and photographer.
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