REGINA – When the Swift Current Broncos captured the WHL championship on home ice last Sunday, Trent McCleary experienced a sense of déjà vu.
It was a quarter-century ago that McCleary – now the team’s chairman of the board – captained the Broncos to victory, with the decisive game also played in town.
“It was the same sort of atmosphere, the same sort of community buy-in,” McCleary said. “It’s amazing that it was 25 years ago because it doesn’t feel like that long, but it has been. The community’s enjoying this.”
By all accounts, Swift Current – a town of less than 17,000 – has been captivated by the Broncos’ playoff run. Fans are expected to be out in full force 250 kilometres east in Regina for the 100th Memorial Cup.
Ironically, their opening opponent Saturday, the QMJHL’s Acadie-Bathurst Titan, hail from the only community in the CHL tinier than Swift Current. Talk about a battle of the Davids.
“It’s a great opportunity to show we’re able to play really good hockey even though we are a small market,” Titan coach Mario Pouliot said.
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Both teams deserve full marks for being here based on their regular seasons. They each finished second in their respective leagues. The playoff marches galvanized their communities – even though the roads to their titles were very different.
The Broncos played in one of the toughest divisions in junior hockey and had to beat the Memorial Cup hosts, the Regina Pats, and the WHL’s top team, the Moose Jaw Warriors, just to reach the third round.
They eventually beat the Everett Silvertips in the final at home. They required a WHL-record 26 games to win it all. (The previous league mark for games played in one post-season was 25, shared by the 1979 Portland Winter Hawks and 1986 Medicine Hat Tigers – both finalists.)
Broncos games were routinely sold out since January and the curling club adjacent to the 2,879-seat arena was opened for the overflow of fans.
“We have 20 per cent of the community coming out to games,” McCleary said. “So, you have 20 per cent of the community that are yelling and screaming and ringing their cowbells.”
For two longtime Broncos, the run was particularly meaningful.
Captain Glenn Gawdin and linemate Tyler Steenbergen were both first-round WHL bantam picks by the franchise in 2012 and 2013, respectively. They’ve spent five and four years in Swift Current and moved from their hometowns in Richmond, B.C., and Sylvan Lake, Alta., to join the club.
They’ve never experienced anything like what they saw during this playoff run.
“You go anywhere around town and there’s going to be a Broncos flag or jersey or someone’s going to recognize you,” said Gawdin, a Calgary Flames prospect and WHL playoff MVP. “It’s definitely pretty cool.”
“It was unbelievable,” added Steenbergen, an Arizona Coyotes pick. “The fans and the town were unreal thorough all the playoffs.”
In Bathurst, N.B., fans would honk their horns at the players or offer encouragement, said captain and fourth-year Titan Jeffrey Truchon-Viel.
“It’s little things like that are great for us,” said the San Jose Sharks signee. “It gives us energy.”
While the Broncos endured a tough path to their title, the Titan’s was much smoother. They won 10 straight games from the end of the first round to the first game of the championship series.
They lost just four times all playoffs and knocked off the top-ranked Blainville-Boisbriand Armada in six games in the final.
Titan GM Sylvain Couturier said almost 300 fans saw his team off at the airport as they it for Regina.
For 2018 NHL Draft prospect Noah Dobson, winning the championship in Bathurst has some added meaning.
Dobson’s parents, Andrew and Jenny, grew up in the community and Noah now lives with grandparents – Andrew’s parents, Kenny and Marina. He also wears No. 53 as a tribute to his late grandfather, David LeBlanc, who died at that age in 2004 after living for almost seven years with multiple sclerosis.
“It was a very neat feeling, something I’ll remember for the rest of my life,” said Dobson, a defenceman. “Bathurst has been a home away from home for me. To be playing junior there is a big honour. It’s very special, especially to win a championship in Bathurst.”
But contending – or even running a successful franchise – isn’t always easy in a small community.
Lean years on the ice have led to challenges at the gate in the past. The Broncos are a community-run team, whereas the Titan are owned by a group of investors, including Couturier’s son, Sean, a centre for the Philadelphia Flyers. That group purchased the team in 2013 after previous owner Leo-Guy Morrissette put the team up for sale in part because of low attendance.
Recruitment is the biggest challenge on the hockey side.
Couturier said he was told by the agents of three or four players he wanted to select with the first pick in the 2015 CHL import draft that they wouldn’t report to Bathurst. Couturier settled on Vladimir Kuznetsov, who produced 68 points in as many games last season.
“Their agents were clear on that,” Couturier said. “They wanted to go to a big market where they were going to be seen a lot more.”
McCleary has heard similar concerns, too, but from players across Western Canada. He calls them “comical.”
As a Swift Current native, McCleary was first listed by the Broncos in 1986 – just after they relocated from Lethbridge, Alta., and months before their tragic bus crash. He was also a call-up on the 1989 championship team, which also won the Memorial Cup.
He’s steadfast in his belief that Swift Current is a great place to play hockey – something that was further evident this spring.
“It’s the highest level of sport in the city. Everybody’s revered,” said the former Montreal Canadien. “They probably don’t realize it until after their careers are over, but Swift Current for some of these kids is as high as they’ll ever get in hockey. It’s special. They were somebody in Swift Current. In other communities, they just kind of blend in.
“This is an amazing place to play hockey. … This is the way it should be.”
