Riga's Rough S77 and the S78 Off-Season

[tcookie 949]

It was a year that started with so much promise, but what was supposed to be a breakout year for the Riga Reign and their cast of S75 draft stars ended today in disappointment with the team finishing up 7th in the European Conference, a point behing Davos and Malmo, who tied for 5th with Malmo earning the wildcard playoff berth on a tiebreaker.

 

It was the sophomore VHL season for Cabe McJake, Addison McLaren, Justin Lose, Artair McCloud, Isau DaMoose, Linus Zetterstrom, and Matt Thunder - a bunch of key players mostly from the S75 draft (Thunder from S74) who have shown a lot of promise and are highly regarded young players around the league. The Reign added Ray Sheilds, General Zod, and James Rose to augment the youngsters and push for contender status. From a purely talent point-of-view, it could've been that way, but Riga's S77 simply never got on track.

 

The Reign started the season 2-10-1. They won 8 of their next 10 games to get back near the .500 mark, but that was as close as they'd get all year. The Reign managed to win four straight games only once, and they followed that one four-game winning streak up with a seven-game losing skid. While they continually got up off the ground and fought back, keeping themselves within striking distance of that one wildcard spot, they looked a long way off from any contention hopes, and traded away Rose and Zod at the trade deadline. Sheilds, who is retiring after the season, could also have been moved but the team couldn't find a deal that made sense.

 

Ultimately, the Reign were too streaky, and not enough in a good way, to close out the deal. Even with the fifth playoff team in the EU boasting a weak record (it would ultimately go to Malmo at 31-36-5), they simply couldn't get the big win they needed to sustain any momentum. Every winning streak was promptly followed by a lengthy skid. Riga's final 23 games of the season consisted of a 3-game winning streak, 3-game losing streak, 2-game winning streak, 3-game losing streak, 3-game winning streak, 5-game losing streak, then a 3-1-0 stretch in their final four games to come up just one point short.

 

Production up and down the lineup was fairly disappointing. Sheilds, an extremely talented player, finished with 62 points in 72 games and never could find chemistry with his linemates. McJake and Zetterstrom followed up solid offensive rookie seasons with 57 and 54 points, respectively. Justin Lose dropped off from 64 to 58 despite increased usage. Only Addison McLaren and Artair McCloud improved on their previous season totals, and that's primarily because their S76 campaigns were only hovering around the 40-point mark to begin with.

 

The Reign had too much talent to finish this way, they thought... yet here they are. A close knit team with good locker room atmosphere on the ice, they simply couldn't find that chemistry on the ice to lead to any sort of results. They finished with the second-worst goals for in the VHL. They actually only allowed 243 goals, a middle-of-the-pack number across the league. What Riga needed was what was supposed to be their biggest strength, their offense, to put up numbers.

 

They didn't, so it's back to the drawing board. With the aforementioned S75 draft class all coming off of their entry-level contracts, GM Benjamin Zeptenbergs will have his hands full this off-season, and some interesting decisions to make. The Reign went all-in on that draft, and they have enough talented players from it that they should be able to turn that core into a contender. But they'll need better results from every single one of those players than they got this season. Can the Reign afford to sign long-term deals with those players in hopes that they find that chemistry? There's an interesting set of decisions ahead for Riga, and they will certainly be a team to watch in the off-season ahead of S78.

[jRuutu 2,492]

9/10

 

Interesting read! Especially for someone like myself who has not been following every team that closely. Structure is clean, which makes the article easy to read. Fair number of research has gone into this and it shows. Overall, I enjoyed it!