At the halfway point of the most trying Battalion season since the team was reborn in North Bay, Head Coach/GM Stan Butler was asked for his midseason grade for his team.
"We'd be on academic probation," replied Butler.
Butler realizes that the 1997-born draft class was not as deep as is customary for the organization, and that, as well as his team's recent poor results, have hamstrung the GM as far as trade talks have gone in 2017.
Having moved pieces from that draft year, Butler admits that eventually, the house of cards collapses, saying, "When you plug holes, eventually the duct tape that you use on those holes gets thin, and eventually there are some cracks in your armour."
"Trading is an interesting thing. You've got to have a partner. Sometimes when your team is not playing very well, people don't think very highly of your players.
"My phone is on. Let's just say it's not ringing a whole lot," said Butler.
Next Monday at noon is the OHL overage trade deadline, with all other players open to movement up until the following day at noon.
Seemingly resigned to keeping the current team intact, Butler suggested that the solution to the recent swoon could be found inside the dressing room. "You hope in life that every time a situation turns to a negative that someone responds and turns it into a positive.
"Maybe there's someone in that room that is going to get opportunities that they wouldn't normally get with other teams or in situations with us and will step up.
"I'd like to hope that some of our younger guys, we've been extremely patient with them, and given them, I think, fair ice time and maybe some of those guys will reward us with becoming more impactful players quicker than other years.
"Other years, the younger guys pretty much got a free ride here because of we always had good older guys like Mike Amadio last year, Matt Santos, Kyle Wood that kind of carried the group. But this year that's not going to happen, so some of those younger guys have got to find ways to contribute more than what they are doing so far," said Butler.
Butler transitioned smoothly, alternating between wearing head coach and general manager hats during his Wednesday media availability at Memorial Gardens.
Butler gave an update on the health of his, at times, injury-ravaged team. Goaltender Mat Woroniuk remains out indefinitely, meaning Julian Sime will continue to play understudy to overager Brent Moran.
Cam Dineen, coming off surgery on his MCL in Arizona was seen sporting a rather large brace on his leg Wednesday, and remains unavailable for at least 10-12 weeks, meaning a return is possible for the final week of the regular season.
Jacob Ball has practiced this week, and barring any setback with his shoulder injury will return to the lineup this weekend for the Battalion's three-game road trip versus Kingston, Peterborough and Ottawa.
Butler acknowledges that his current group has presented the greatest challenge coaching-wise in the three-plus seasons in North Bay. "The losing stops when you decide it stops," Butler relayed that he has told his players. "As a group, they have to come together and realize what it takes for them to win."
On the current seven-game winless streak, Butler observed that he "didn't think they played badly in our last couple of games. The Sudbury game, we could have won. The Mississauga game, we could have won. But, you don't get points in hockey for effort, you only get points if you score one more goal than the other team."
"Sometimes you go through stretches where you win games and, quite frankly, you probably don't deserve to and then you go through stretches where you lose games where you probably should have won," said Butler.
With a much weaker Eastern Conference-heavy schedule remaining, including six dates with Central Division leaders Sudbury, and five with bottom-of-the-conference Barrie, and three with second-to-last Niagara, Butler feels that there is an opportunity for his squad to finish strongly.
"It's not going to be easy, but we are in control of our own fate," said the coach.
