Just yesterday, they were minor hockey players here in Prince George.
OK, a whole bunch of extra time has slipped through the hourglass. But it seems like Nick Drazenovic and Brett Connolly should still be those hugely-talented youngsters who wielded their sticks like magic wands and, in the process, helped conjure up victory after victory for their respective Prince George Minor Hockey Association rep teams.
Maybe there was a gap in the space-time continuum and we powered right over top of it. Because somehow, Drazenovic and Connolly are now grown men who get paid to play the game in the American Hockey League.
And tonight, they will go head-to-head in Game 1 of a best-of-seven playoff series.
Drazenovic skates for the Springfield Falcons and Connolly is a member of the Syracuse Crunch. The teams will clash in an Eastern Conference semifinal and the winner will advance to face either the Providence Bruins or Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins in the conference final.
The series between the Falcons and Crunch should be a beauty. Springfield is the second seed in the east and Syracuse -- the defending Calder Cup champion -- entered the playoffs as the third seed.
Because of their differences in age, the 26-year-old Drazenovic and 21-year-old Connolly were never teammates as kids. Their careers, however, took similar paths because both were first-round bantam draft picks of the Western Hockey League's Prince George Cougars (Drazenovic 11th overall in 2002 and Connolly 10th overall in 2007) and later became property of NHL franchises. Drazenovic was drafted by the St. Louis Blues in the sixth round in 2005 and Connolly was a first-round selection of the Tampa Bay Lightning in 2010.
After five seasons in the Blues' organization -- spent mostly with the AHL's Peoria Rivermen -- Drazenovic inked a deal with the Columbus Blue Jackets in the summer of 2011 and was assigned to their affiliate team in Springfield, Mass. He's now in his second season with the Falcons and has emerged as one of their top offensive players. During the 2012-13 regular schedule, he finished second in team scoring with 17 goals and 53 points in 62 games and was named the club's forward of the year. Drazenovic's fine play earned him a late-season call-up by the Blue Jackets, who had him in uniform for eight games. Overall, he has now skated in 11 NHL contests and will have a great chance to crack the Jackets' roster as early as next season.
In the first round of the AHL playoffs, the Falcons eliminated the Manchester Monarchs last Saturday when Drazenovic scored a series-clinching overtime goal in a 4-3 Springfield victory (go to pgcitizen.ca and click on Citizen Video to see the goal). The Falcons won the best-of-five affair in four games and, in those contests, Drazenovic had one goal and a pair of assists.
Meanwhile, Connolly and the Crunch -- the affiliate team of the Lightning -- rolled to a three-game sweep of the Portland Pirates. In the series, Connolly scored once and also had a helper.
In the bigger picture, Connolly won't be an AHL player for long. In 2011-12, he saw action in 68 NHL games with the Lightning and, as a teenaged rookie, posted four goals and 11 assists. For the lockout-shortened 2012-13 campaign, Connolly was assigned to the Crunch and had a breakout year with 31 goals and 63 points in 71 outings. Last month, the Lightning brought him up for five games and he added another goal to his NHL totals. At around the same time he was sent back to Syracuse, he was named an AHL all-star.
These guys used to be little kids with big dreams. Now, after years of hard work and unwavering commitment, they are living the lives they always wanted.
For the sake of a writer who remembers them from their days of rep hockey dominance at the Kin Centre, just one more flashback, please.
First, Drazenovic.
In his bantam draft year, he amassed 51 goals and 100 points in 59 games with the Farr Fabricating Cougars and was a standout player every time he was on the ice. His coach, Jason Tansem, called him "lethal" around the net and Dave Smith, then a scout for the WHL's Seattle Thunderbirds, had this to say about him:
"He's very driven as to the way he plays hockey. He's got a real good sense for going to the net and capitalizing on his opportunities.
"He's got tremendous skill with the puck," Smith added. "That's obviously one of his better assets. He's not the biggest kid out there but his puck skills probably set him apart from a lot of his peers."
Now, Connolly.
Back in his bantam hockey days, he already had a booming shot and was deceptively fast on his feet. The year he was drafted into the WHL, he had connected for 51 goals and 96 points with the Farr Fab Cats. Connolly's coach at the time, Greg Pocock, saw him as a guy with a "tremendous gift" for the game.
"He's physical when he has the puck and he has a very good, fluid skating stride," Pocock told The Citizen in May of 2007. "When you watch him, he doesn't look like he's working all that hard or that he's really trying, but then you look at the guys who are skating beside him trying to keep up to him and they're just going a million miles an hour."
Game 1 between the Falcons and Crunch starts at 7 p.m. in Springfield, or 4 p.m. Prince George time.
No doubt, a lot of people here in P.G. would love to be in the seats at Springfield's MassMutual Center tonight and Saturday, which is when Game 2 hits the ice. Most of us will have to settle for TV or online highlights during the series. Webcasts via TheAHL.com will also be an option.
The bigger problem will be this -- figuring out which team to cheer for.
