Steve Chelios is like a lot of hockey coaches – always on the lookout for new talent.
The younger brother of future NHL hall-of-famer Chris Chelios, Steve Chelios has a simple wish list: four or five players who can play the game of hockey.
Once he finds them, he figures it will be smooth sailing for the Iron Range Ironheads (0-11-0), a Superiaor International Junior Hockey League expansion team that has played 11 games this season, all of them losses.
The latest came Saturday night at Fort William Gardens, an 8-0 defeat at the hands of Carter McEachern and the Thunder Bay North Stars (8-5-3), winners of eight of their last nine games.
Chelios, the first-year coach who spent a dozen years as a player buried in the minor pros, says his game plan isn't that tough to follow.
"If a team like this is so inexperienced, with first-year guys who are getting thrown into the fire and getting more ice time than they're ready for, as long as we keep it simple, and we play good defensive zone coverage, we can stay in games and pretty much frustrate teams until we're in a situation where we get on the power play, and that's where we're going to get our offense."
The trouble, he added, is the first period.
On Friday night they surrendered 10 goals on their way to a 21-2 drubbing. On Saturday they cut that total in half, but it's still far too many against a team like the North Stars, especially one on a roll.
"We learned a lot," Chelios said. "Again, some lapses in the first period really put us in a hole. We can't play from behind. When you're down three or four goals, we're not a team that can make up four or five goals in a period right now.
"But we are learning. The kids aren't giving up and we've just got to kind of suffer through this tough time until we get probably four or five players in here who are going to make all the difference in the world. We've got to find them, we've got to get them, but it's not realistic to think if we play well we're going to win hockey games against teams that have two- and three-year veteran players."
Chelios, 43, said he was stymied from the start, getting late approval from USA Hockey, which set back his ability to recruit until most of the available talent had already found teams to play for.
"Anytime you start up a new team you're going to go through some growing pains," he said. "I'm not patient with that, to be honest. It's something I think you can get over if you have a good system and the players are disciplined with what they do. But realistically we are in the position we are in now because I couldn't recruit," Chelios said.
The inexperience showed again on Saturday, as the North Stars fired at will on starting Ironheads goalie Michael Porter in the opening period.
Matt Kaarela, who finished the night with a pair of goals and an assist, redirected a Tyler Osborne shot from the point to kick-start the Thunder Bay offence just 4:11 into the game. Sixty-nine seconds later he notched his second, bouncing a weak shot past Porter.
Late in the period, goals 28 seconds apart by Isaac Howarth and Brennen Dubchak sent Porter to the bench in favour of Chris Stokke, having surrendered four goals on 11 shots.
Sam Dubinsky beat him two minutes later, but Stokke settled the defensive side of the Ironheads game down, to the frustration of the Stars.
"I think we could have scored what we scored last night, we just didn't push the envelope as hard as we did last night," North Stars coach Todd Howarth said. "They played better tonight, but I think we missed quality opportunities to do things.
"I think we over-passed about 900 times tonight. But I give my guys credit and they worked hard."
Howarth added he wanted his troops to concentrate on making set plays work, a tactic that succeeded many times over.
"We scored four goals of them tonight, so I was pretty happy with that."
Spencer Hogan and Kyle Breukelman pushed the lead to 7-0 in the second, with Bradley Cox putting the finishing touches on a 29-goal weekend late in the third.
With the win the Stars climbed into a third place tie with Sioux Lookout. Both teams have 19 points.
Elsewhere in the SIJHL on Saturday:
Dryden 4, Duluth 0: Kim Wildhaber made 27 stops and the Ice Dogs got goals from four different players in blanking the second-year Clydesdales.
Wisconsin 5, Fort Frances 1: Anthony Calabrese had two goals and an assist and the Wilderness pulled to within two points of the front-running Lakers. Byron Katapaytuk had the lone Fort Frances goal.
FIRST PERIOD
Scoring: 1. Thunder Bay, Kaarela (Osborne, Rempel) 4:11 pp. 2. Thunder Bay, Kaarela (Lapenskie, Dubchak) 5:20. 3. Thunder Bay, Howarth (Dubinsky, Desserre) 16:13. 4. Thunder Bay, Dubchak (Desserre, Lapenskie) 16:41. 5. Thunder Bay, Dubinsky (Fullum, Cox) 18:52. Penalties: Bench minor IRO (delay of game, served by Peratalo)3:21, O'Neill IRO (slashing) 11:08, Alexander TB (holding) 12:11. Desserre TB (roughing) 13:16.
SECOND PERIOD
Scoring: 6. Thunder Bay, Hogan (Dubinsky, Dessere) 8:43. 7. Thunder Bay, Breukelman (Kaarela) 18:52. Penalties: Torres IRO (roughing), Wolframe TB (cross checking) 20:00.
THIRD PERIOD
Scoring: 8. Thunder Bay, Cox (Fullum, Mascarin) 19:41.Penalties: Bogacki TB (hooking) 4:42, Wolframe TB (slashing) 6:28, Kaarela TB (roughing) 13:07.
GAME DATA - SOG - Iron Range 3-8-11-22, Thunder Bay 12-15-17-44; Power plays (goals-chances) - Iron Range (0-5), Thunder Bay (1-2); Goaltenders - Iron Range: Michael Porter (11 shots, four goals), Chris Stokke (16:41 first), Thunder Bay: Carter McEachern; A: 150 (estimated).
