Steinbach Pistons draw big crowd for pre-season action

If fans had wandered into the Southeast Event Centre Sept. 5 for the Steinbach Pistons pre-season game against the Winkler Flyers, you couldn’t have blamed them if they thought it was a regular season contest.

Despite taking place on the long weekend, the Pistons were the hottest ticket in town, drawing 1,300 fans, including more than 750 paid to watch teams of mostly prospects battle for roster spots.

“It’s pretty impressive the type of support we got here today,” head coach and general manager Paul Dyck said after the 6-5 shootout loss to Winkler.

“For some of the players playing their first game here, I think they were pretty impressed too.”

Across the entire Manitoba Junior Hockey League season last year, just 11 games outside of Steinbach drew more than 1,000 fans, with no team averaging more than 750 per game aside from the Pistons.

“We’re grateful the people came out,” Dyck said.

“There’s a lot going on a Labour Day long weekend, but we’re glad they chose the Pistons.”

The only difference was the jerseys each team wore, as the squads from Winkler and Steinbach donned practice jerseys instead of their usual full kit.

It’s another year of big turnover for the Steinbach Pistons, similar to the past few seasons. The team has still been competitive despite the year-to-year changes.

“You’d prefer that not to be the case,” Dyck said with a chuckle when asked if he was getting used coaching up a new roster every season.

“You could see the guys who came back, we had a neutral zone forecheck where the veterans just executed it perfectly, then the next time it goes out we’ve got young guys and it looks entirely different. I don’t know if you ever get used to it.”

The game against Winkler Sept. 4 was the first Pistons game action for a pair of veteran players Dyck traded for this off-season, as defenseman Gavin Haslam and Lyndon Lamb made their debuts.

“They’re going to bring stability for us, maturity and leadership,” Dyck said.

“I wasn’t surprised at all when the game started going off the rails those two guys stepped up for us.”

On the ice, Steinbach looked great to start the game, getting out to a three-goal lead while dominating the shot clock before fading in the second half of the game.

“A lot of it came off of some ill-advised decisions with the puck,” Dyck said.

“Our puck management was not very good. Just high risk decisions shift after shift. It was pretty good until we went up 3-0. Then we just threw all caution to the wind and started playing riverboat hockey, and that’s what you get.”

Offensively it was a magical night for Mitchell’s Jevon Peters. The 2010-born forward potted a pair of goals on the night and was named the first star of the game. Last season, his first in the U18 AAA ranks, Peters scored 32 points in 48 games.

“Pretty special memory for him I’m sure,” Dyck said.

“I thought the line was really good, they were one of the lines that generated a lot of offense for us. They were just buzzing… They had some good looks yesterday too.”

Fellow Mitchell forward William Picklyk, who scored 20 goals as a rookie last season for Steinbach, hasn’t seen any action for the Pistons yet this pre-season as he recovers from an injury, but the 17-year-old is set to return to Steinbach.

Steinbach will play two more pre-season games, both against Niverville. They’ll be in La Salle Sept. 11 and at the SEC Sept. 12.

“We’ve got two more weeks before the puck drops in Winkler, we have some work to do,” Dyck said.

“The results aren’t necessarily the primary focus, we just want to see growth.”

Steinbach will make their SEC regular season debut Sept. 19 as they renew hostilities with the Flyers.