Bears with Near-Term Promise
I surveyed some keen hockey observers in the Hershey community the past couple of days to see if they could help me identify the names of two or three Bears whose regular season performances in 2007-08 ought to have Caps' fans excited about their arrival at fall training camp, as contenders for roster spots with the parent club. I found them all right.
Chris Bourque was recently named Hershey's team MVP. In what may have been a make-or-break season for him, CBourque put an exclamation point on his prospect candidacy with a late-season explosion: 8 goals and 7 assists in his final eight games. On the season, CBourque tallied 28 goals and 35 assists for 63 points in 73 games --nearly a point a game in an exceptionally patchwork Bears' lineup. Line chemistry was not a storyline in this Hershey season: another week or two of regular season and about 50 hockey players would have donned maroon sweaters. CBourque is a left-shooting left wing, but with Matt Pettinger's departure and some uncertainty on left side after the Alexes heading into the summer, the 2004 second-rounder should be a contender for the left side of the third line come fall.
Caps' fans by now know a bit of the promise packaged in rearguard Sami Lepisto. Injuries and recalls to D.C. limited Lepisto to 55 games in Hershey, but he made an impact in just about every one of them: 4 goals and 41 assists to lead all Bears' blueliners in scoring. At the time of his April 9 recall, Lepisto was lodged in the top 5 of AHL defensemen in scoring and finished his American League rookie season a stellar +29. In 2004 Lepisto was named the IIHF World Junior Championship's Outstanding Defenseman and was selected to the All Tournament team. He's modest in size ( 5'11, 180) but heady and mobile and a superb passer. A third-round selection by the Caps in the team's remarkable 2004 draft, Lepisto's stint in the A may be but a single season.
Last spring Caps' General Manager George McPhee told me that he thought newly signed center/winger Andrew Gordon's stay in the American League might also be a brief one. A year later, that forecast appears accurate. Early in the season Gordon struggled with the transition from college hockey straight into the American League, but his demotion to South Carolina didn't last long. In his first pro season he recorded a pair of hat tricks in Hershey en route to 16 goals and 35 assists in 58 games, skating a +22 in the process. A right-handed shot, Gordon seemed to settle in on the right side, often alongside another NCAA draftee, 2003 8th-rounder Andrew Joudrey. Gordon is a brilliant skater with excellent vision, a scorer's hands, and a nose for the net.
I asked my American Hockey League experts up north to identify a bit of a darkhorse prospect for Caps' training camp come fall, and center Jay Beagle was a consensus selection. The Caps inked Beagle to a two-year contract just last month, so it's clear that management sees potential in him. The 6'3, 200-lb. Calgary native spent two seasons skating with Alaska-Anchorage in the WCHA, got a cup of coffee with Idaho in the ECHL, and was an invitee to the Caps' development camp last July, where he impressed. Beagle scored 19 goals and 18 assists in 64 games with the Bears this season and was lauded for his physical presence and all-around game.
Another Bear most worth regular season ending praise is Head Coach Bob Woods, who took over for the promoted-to-the-parent-club-Caps Bruce Boudreau at Thanksgiving. Woods won 33 games behind the bench after Thanksgiving and did so presiding over a veritable M*A*S*H unit in the process. I highly recommend the overview of Woodsie's bench work authored this week by Bears' radio voice John Walton, who makes the case for Woods' winning the A's Coach of the Year award.
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