The 2018-19 B.C. Hockey League season begins this Friday for the Cowichan Valley Capitals, and head coach Mike Vandekamp is closing in on what his opening-day roster will look like.
“We’re in the midst of trying to get the numbers down to where they need to be,” he said on Tuesday morning. “There’s a lot going on; a lot of moving parts.”
That very morning, the Caps had added a new face to the batch by acquiring forward Paul Selleck from the Alberni Valley Bulldogs for future considerations.
“That adds another forward to the mix,” Vandekamp said. “Now we have too many guys at both positions. We’re trying to sort that out.”
A product of Laguna Beach, California, Selleck made his BCHL debut with the Bulldogs last season, scoring 17 goals and assisting on 15 for 32 points in 58 games, while spending just 12 minutes in the penalty box. He added a goal and an assist in seven playoff games. Before coming to B.C., Selleck played with the Anaheim Jr. Ducks 18U team in the Tier 1 Elite Hockey League.
“We picked up Paul when we decided we needed another centre with experience,” Vandekamp explained.
The Caps are allowed to have 23 players on their roster. As Vandekamp points out, they can keep as many players around as they want, but they need to have those 23 cards determined before their season opener on Friday.
“We’ve got to have our roster in working order by game time,” he said.
The Caps wrapped up the exhibition schedule on the weekend with a home-and-home series against the Victoria Grizzlies. Cowichan was edged 3-2 at the Island Savings Centre on Friday, getting third-period goals from Vincent Millette and Luc Wilson. The Caps rebounded to win 2-1 in Sooke on Saturday afternoon on goals by Hunter Floris and Lucas Vanroboys.
The team finished preseason play with three wins and two losses, and Vandekamp felt the exhibition games served their purpose.
“They’re always helpful,” he said. “Pretty much everyone got into four games. We know what each of the players are going to bring to the table. And we got better as a team; the guys have a better understanding of the systems we want to play.
“We told them the exhibition games would be used for both evaluation and preparation, and I think we were able to accomplish both those things.”
The Caps will have a series of workouts, practices and meetings this week leading up to their season opener at home against Alberni on Friday at 7 p.m. The next night they will visit Vandekamp’s former team, the Nanaimo Clippers, for their first road date of the season. Vandekamp isn’t thinking too much about his return to the Frank Crane Arena.
“I think right now, it’s first things first,” he said. “We need to be ready for Friday and get off to a good start. It doesn’t really matter this time of year who we’re playing. We need to prepare the team, deal with nerves and emotions. We’ll get to Saturday when we get there. I’m just a coach; I’m just one person involved in the whole thing. It will be a little strange — I spent parts of seven seasons with that organization — to be on the other bench, but it’s not about me. We want to win the game like any other game.”