Theme Week: VHL at 15

[badcolethetitan 938]

Theme Week: VHL at 15

 

 

There are a lot of great topics to potentially talk about for VHL at 15, but I'm going to talk about my experience in the VHLE. I have heard a bunch of horror stories about the E, but I thought I should shine some positivity on my experience when I was in the E last season!

 

The VHLE Draft

 

It was S83, which was my draft year for the VHL and the VHLE, and I was already selected by HC Davos Dynamo 4th overall. Heading into the VHLE Draft, I knew I was going to go most likely in the first round, as I wasn't high enough TPE to start in the VHL. I was reached out by a few teams in the E, those being: The Istanbul Red Wolves, Bratislava Watchmen, and the Geneva Rush. However, one interview in particular stood out to me and that was the interview with @KaleebtheMighty, the General Manager for the Istanbul Red Wolves. I knew immediately after talking to Kaleeb for a bit, that I wanted to play for Istanbul, and my dream came true when I was selected 4th overall to the Istanbul Red Wolves! I was super excited to be with the team and I honestly had pretty low expectations for the E, but I was ready to get it started!

 

The VHLE Regular Season and Meeting New People

 

I don't honestly remember much about the beginning of the regular season record wise, I know we were at the top of the table I believe, but we weren't an amazing team. However, we had an amazing locker room, one that I honestly don't know if it'll be topped, it hasn't been topped yet! It was an amazing time talking to @jacobcarson877 and @Brandon on the team every single day, those guys are a blast to be with and should you be reading this and ever get on a team with them, you're in for a treat. Us three mainly dominated the locker room and were the ones talking most of the time, with other people occasionally dropping in and saying hi. My most memorable experience from the regular season in Istanbul was when we were around the 50 game mark, and we were 5 points out of a playoff spot. @KaleebtheMighty told me to say a speech to get the boys hyped up, and I said my famous Wolves speech that ended up netting us a 12 game win streak, and a playoff spot at the end of the day. I swear to god Simon must of heard our speech, because I've never seen anything like that happen ever in my time here, it must've been a miracle! However, despite the miracles that were being done for the Istanbul Red Wolves, our season came down to the last day of sims. We were only a couple points in the playoffs, and Geneva could catch us with their last two games (they played us and Bratislava), which would knock us out of the playoffs. I was due for another speech, so another speech was said to get the boys hyped up. Somehow, yet again, the speech worked and we ended up making the playoffs only by a couple of points. At this point, I was already immortalized in Istanbul Red Wolves history, just for some funny speeches that somehow ended up winning us games. Regardless, it did work for us and now we were heading to the playoffs, in which everyone thought we had a chance to win it all. I think going into the playoffs, everyone including myself was super hyped, because we just thought "well, if things get rough, just bring out the speeches and the series is won!" Little did we know, we already used all our speech power and we would get eliminated in the first round.

 

The VHLE Playoffs

 

Sadly, the VHLE Playoffs were cut short for us. We ended up taking a 3-1 lead against the Bratislava Watchmen and at the time we thought that the series was over. Little did we know, the Watchmen would win 3 in a row and end up taking the series 4-3. I remember my Game 7 speech trying to pull off another miracle for us, but it seemed I used all my miracle speech points during the regular season to get us to the playoffs, and unfortunately it didn't work. It was pretty sad to lose 3 in a row and get eliminated, especially since we thought at that point the series was over. It was tough to lose like that, a bunch of us wanted to keep the season going, because we didn't want to have to leave each other to head to the VHL, but all good things eventually come to an end. That team was for sure special, and I think it'll take a long time for a team like that to happen again in the VHLE, despite us not winning the championship, it's about the experience we had. At the end of the day, we will never know if we could've took down Vasteras in the finals, which is very unfortunate because I feel like we had a chance. Regardless, our season was over and I was kind of sad. I was going to be moving on, heading to the VHL and to HC Davos Dynamo, to where I would most likely not play with my teammates on Istanbul for a very long time.

 

The Goodbyes and Moving to the VHL

 

Everyone that was on Istanbul holds a special place in my heart, that team was nothing short of spectacular and I wish sometime, we could all meet again on the same team. I think we all realized that despite stories, we all had a great time on Istanbul and it is a great place to play. Special shoutout to @KaleebtheMighty and @Spaz for having me on their team and forging such a wonderful experience each season with Istanbul. After all the horror stories of the E, I'm super glad I landed on Istanbul and I would love to play for them in some shape or form in the future. For any new player that is reading this and has doubts about the VHLE, don't. My time on Istanbul was the best I've had in my career in the VHL so far, and you should be looking forward to it! To this day, I still have yet to experience the same emotional bond I have towards Istanbul, however I'm still very young in my VHL career, so who knows what might happen?

 

1020 Words, not counting headings.

 

[KaleebtheMighty 1,539]

 

Thank you so much for those kind words! Truly one of the greatest locker rooms I’ve ever been able to put together, I’ll never forget those speeches!!

[badcolethetitan 938]

29 minutes ago, KaleebtheMighty said:

 

Thank you so much for those kind words! Truly one of the greatest locker rooms I’ve ever been able to put together, I’ll never forget those speeches!!

 

One day I will return!

[Spaz 297]

14 hours ago, badcolethetitan said:

 

One day I will return!

You said kind words your whole article and now you're going to threaten us, hahaha jk we loved having you around