Claimed:A Look Back At The Express' Season II [Final: 6/6]

[RomanesEuntDomus 442]

A Look Back At The Express' Season

 

Part II, continued from Part I

 

Jakob Linholm

 

A dark horse candidate to have a break-out season, Jakob Linholm didn’t live up to the expectations at all. After showing a lot of promise following his trade from New York to Cologne, Linholm went back to being that disinterested and inconsistent player that the fans in New York had grown frustrated with and that had lead to the Americans trading him in the first place. Linholm only put up 27 points despite getting top-line ice-time for parts of the season and his -13 rating was second worst on the team. The Express’ reaction to this abysmal season came promptly: Just a few weeks into the off-season, Jakob Linholm was traded to the Calgary Dragons in a deal to bring in Godavari Yumalatopinto and once again, Linholm was merely a throw-in.

 

Thomas O’Malley

 

 

Everybody expected great things from first overall pick Thomas O’Malley this season, but somehow he was still able to exceed all these expectations. The young American had one of the most memorable rookie seasons the VHL has ever seen and finished his first year in the league with an incredible 110 points, the best number by a rookie in two decades and good for 7^th on the all-time rookie scoring list! O’Malley was rewarded for these efforts with the Christian Stolzwschweiger Trophy and not surprisingly, he is already a fan favorite in Cologne. This doesn’t mean that he couldn’t still experience the dreaded sophomore slump next season though, as a lot of things have changed in Cologne this off-season. With veteran top scorers Wesley Kellinger and Karsten Olsen gone, O’Malley will get a lot more attention from the oppositions blue liners next season and it will be interesting to see how he’ll handle being the clear focal point of a team’s offense.

 

Karsten Olsen

 

Karsten Olsen was brought in as a deadline acquisition to provide some timely secondary scoring for the Cologne Express, but in his short time in Cologne the veteran forward did way more than what was asked from him. Olsen scored 39 points for both Seattle and Cologne last season – the difference is that it took him 51 games to get to that mark with Seattle and only 21 with Cologne! His 14 goals and 25 assists as well as his +19 rating and 70 hits are all amazing stats and just counting his time with Cologne, Olsen had the best points-per game average in the entire league, even better than Niklas Lindberg before his trade to Riga. One can only imagine how great of a seasons Olsen could’ve had if he had spent the whole year with the Express… Sadly this was Olsen’s last season in the VHL, but he certainly went out with a bang!

 

Blaine Olynick

 

 

One of the quieter and less talked about goalies in the VHL, Blaine Olynick has been consistently improving over the last few seasons and is on the verge of becoming one of the leagues elite goalies now. He just posted his second 92+ save-percentage season in a row and also improved in pretty much all other statistical categories including goals against average, wins and shutouts. With some of the great old goalies like Lennox Moher and Eggly Bagelface retiring, now would be the perfect time for Olynick to work his way into that elite group of goalies that includes names such as Brick Wahl and Mike Szkatkowski Jr. Even in his current form Olynick is already one of the backbones of this Cologne Express time but if he were to make that next step, Cologne could be scary good these next few seasons.

Edited December 7, 2014 by RomanesEuntDomus

[NotAVHLM-GM 1,858]

Thanks for the mention

[twillcox94 21]

Content: 3/3

Good overview of how each player performed during the season. 

 

Grammar: 2/2 Nothing much at all.

Calgary Dragons --> Wranglers ... unless I am missing something.

 great of a seasons --> season

 

Appearance: 1/1

Nice and clean with pictures.

 

Total: 6/6

FINAL: 6/6

[Kesler 1,514]

Claimed