The Henderson Silver Knights hover on the edge of the playoff race, close enough to see it but still need a push to get there. Entering the stretch run, Henderson sits six points behind the Tucson Roadrunnerswith the Pacific Division standings tightening by the week.
In the American Hockey League Pacific Division, where the top seven teams qualify for the Calder Cup Playoffs, the margin for error is small. For Henderson, the postseason picture remains within reach, but the path to getting there is almost entirely through divisional opponents.
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I’ve been talking head coach Ryan Craig to discuss where his team stands at the final push. Our conversation focused on Henderson’s surge early in the season, the challenges that followed and how the coaching staff sees the path forward as the play-off race tightens.
Q&A from Ryan Craig
THW: First off, I think you guys have two games left in San Jose, but have you been able to recoup the All-Star break a little bit?
Craig: “We knew we had 29 games left after the All-Star break. I believe we still have 63 days left. That would have started on Saturday. We know what position we’re in. We have some games that relate to the teams we’re playing, the teams we’re trying to catch. We feel like we’ve been playing good hockey and not the best hockey we can, or that our play needs to improve in certain areas. Obviously you have to accumulate points and that moral victories are what you need to do. We have to take the next step: convert good, solid games into points and continue to rise in the rankings.’
THW: How has that break allowed you to evaluate the season so far? The good, the bad, the meh?
Craig: “The first ten games were very good – a good start. Then we had to call everything out by name. We had call-ups and injuries to some very good players. Bowman went up, Carl Lindbom went up – two very deserving guys, and that’s what we want to see in the American Hockey League: guys getting opportunities. Ralph (Raphaël) Lavoie got off to a really good start and we missed him, but other guys got more opportunities. We’ve had some good opportunities. Things happen and there are some growing pains. If we get Carl (Lindbom) back and get back to some health, we hope that our group takes advantage of those opportunities earlier this year. We have to find more consistency – from team to team, from period to period and from game to game.
THW: Based on this evaluation, do you think this group is ahead of what you expected, behind, or about right?
Craig: “Yes, you’re going to have ups and downs throughout a season. We’re one game over .500 and there’s still a lot of hockey left in a short space of time. We’d obviously like to be in a better position now, but you go through ebbs and flows. You can look at Abbotsford last year – they were around where we are now and went to work and finished as Calder Cup champions. We’re not looking that far ahead; we’re focused on Friday when we play our best game against Abbotsford. “We’re probably about where we are right now. We’ve had opportunities to get more points, but through setbacks and times when we haven’t played well, we have to get better as individuals and as a team as we get through the last 27 games.”
THW: You talked about it before with Lindbom, but what was it like working with three young goaltenders this season?
Craig: “Carl showed up and played – he’s played 15 games for us and eight for Vegas and has been around for over six weeks. He’s a very creditable guy who’s now had a taste of the NHL on a few different occasions, and that’s really cemented him as the No. 3 goaltender, the next call up in the pecking order of our organization. It gave Jesper Vikman the opportunity to play 18 games and Cameron Whitehead had to come in from Tahoe to get experience with our group. That only benefits us in the long run as a team and organization with our depth. Our goalies are the backbone of our team. We’re proud that we did that on Saturday and we didn’t do well enough on Sunday in San Jose, so they’re a big part of it, and everyone that played for us this year helped give us opportunities, and getting contributions throughout the lineup has supported how we want to play.
THW: If we follow that up, the defense has played an important role in producing goals this season. How satisfied have you been with that aspect of the team?
Craig“We knew as an organization that we were going to be young up front, so it was important to find ways to move the puck from under the tops of our circles and goal line into the hands of our attackers in good positions to get out of our way. We brought in Jaycob Megna, who became our captain, Dylan Coghlan, who is back for a second year, Jérémy Davies and a healthy Lukas Cormier. Those four have really solidified our back end at various times with guys in and out of the line-up, Davies has probably been the most consistent without missing time, while Coghlan and Megna have both been called up and dealt with injuries, but they have made sure we have been able to rely on them. We really like our setting – we think it is the backbone of our team, along with our goalkeeping when we are playing at our best.
THW: You mention your youth in advance, what was that like? There is an abundance of talent. How did that group impress you?
Craig: “If you look at our lineup, a young guy like Ben Hemmerling is essentially in his rookie season after missing four or five months last year with a shoulder injury, and he’s found a home on the right side with Tanner Laczynski, an AHL All-Star and arguably one of the top players in the league. Ben has done a really good job of establishing his game. Jackson Hallum came in as an older freshman player from the University of Michigan, and his maturity, speed and understanding of the other young freshman players come in all situations forward, and then you have players in their second year like Uronen and Cataford. Then you have players like Kai Uchacz, Sapovaliv in his second year, and Brabenec when healthy. We talk about being young up front, and those guys have done a really good job of giving us depth and moving into different roles as opportunities arise.”
THW: Still 27 games to go until the end of the season, play-offs are of course the goal, but the most important question is how. How do you hope the coming months will unfold?
Craig: “I don’t think we can look too far ahead. We play a lot of weekend sets and back-to-backs, mostly in our division. We only have four non-division games left – two in Milwaukee and Texas coming here for two – and then we see Tucson six times, Abbotsford, Calgary and Ontario again. The schedule starts with big division games against teams we know and understand what it takes to beat, but we don’t have to look any further than this weekend against Abbotsford. We’re at home and playing five of our games here next six, but the focus is on being ready at puck drop Friday night and stacking shifts, periods and games on top of each other, starting with one.”
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