It's not the NHL but Brett Connolly is having fun when he steps onto the ice these days.
"It's fun to win," said the former Prince George Cougar about playing with the Syracuse Crunch, the American Hockey League affiliate of the Tampa Bay Lightning, this season. "When you're a part of a winning team it's a lot of fun to go to the rink every day; it's happy and upbeat."
The Crunch headed into their final two games before Christmas with a 17-6-1-2 record and took a three-game win streak into Friday's home game versus the Adriondack Phantoms (11-14-1) and Saturday's game with the visiting Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins (13-11-1-1).
Connolly is in the second year of his entry-level contract with the Lightning so the NHL club was able to send the 20-year-old to it's minor league affiliate prior to the lockout. After struggling to find his footing in Syracuse for the first few weeks, Connolly has emerged has one of the team's top forwards.
"It was a little bit of an adjustment period there but it's been great, the guys have welcomed me with open arms and, obviously Jon has been great and been a big part of my early success this season," said Connolly, second in Crunch scoring with 12 goals and 23 points in 25 games.
Jon would be Jon Cooper, the Prince George native and head coach of the Crunch.
"It's very cool to be a part of a team with another guy with Prince George roots," said Connolly. "We talk about it from time to time. We actually grew up pretty near each other. I was in Westwood and he grew up in an area near there."
It's fun for Cooper as well to coach someone from Prince George and a player drafted sixth overall in the NHL entry draft, though he knows it's a stigma that can be tough on Connolly when it comes to living up to the pressures and expectations that come with being a top pick.
"I think it was hard for him in the beginning because he had all the weight on his shoulders of a guy that played 60-plus games in the NHL and he comes down here and he's just a guy trying to fit in and he's got to learn the style of play I like and adapt to that," said Cooper. "You're going from flying first class in planes to being scrunched together on a bus. It was probably a little bit of a culture shock for him.
"He struggled early but when he started to buy in to what we were selling, he's been probably our best player for the last month," added Cooper.
During last season in Tampa Bay, Connolly found himself a healthy scratch more often then he would've liked, which makes him appreciate the icetime he has logged with the Crunch so far.
"When you're contributing you gain confidence," said Connolly. "Last year was tough. I wasn't scoring and I wasn't contributing the way I would've liked. When you're scoring and contributing and playing a lot of minutes you get better."
Connolly credits Cooper with pushing him to not accept the status quo.
"He's been hard on me since Day 1 and it's helped me out tremendously, absorbing everything he has to say in terms of the little areas of my game and my habits," said Connolly. "I kind of got it easy last year being the younger guy, the rookie and the guy who wasn't counted on heavily to produce. I wasn't really harped on or getting yelled at or anything like that.
"With Syracuse I'm playing a bigger role and that comes with bigger expectations so he's going to be harder on me when I'm not doing the little things right," he added. "It's showing and it's benefitting my play as of late."
This week, Connolly was weighing his options about how he wanted to vote as the NHL player's association set about asking its membership whether or not they should decertify the union, which could tie the NHL up in court to determine the legalities of the lockout.
"I've just got to decide what I want to do and what directions I want to go in for me," said Connolly. "It was my first year in the league last year but it's all important to me still. I'll make a decision here pretty soon on what I'm going to do."
If there is a shortened NHL season starting in January it wouldn't be certain if Connolly would return to Tampa Bay or finish the season in Syracuse.
"Obviously you want to be playing in the NHL but, then again you want to be the best player you can be so if there are things you need to work on you get that done early in your career so when you go up [to the NHL] you're ready to play and jump into a bigger role and not be out of the lineup or not succeeding," said Connolly. "Again all I control is how I play and then I have to let the chips fall where they may."
The Crunch only have a three-day break for Christmas so Connolly plans to spend his time off in Toronto rather than in airports trying to get to Prince George but before he returns to action himself on Boxing Day in Binghamton against the Senators, he'll be partaking in the annual Canadian tradition of watching the World Junior Championship.
"I was a part of it for two years in a row," said Connolly about the silver and bronze medals he won with Canada in 2011 and 2012. "Ever since I was a little kid I was a fan of the tournament. Now that I'm too old I'm right back to being a fan."
When the Crunch faced off Friday with the Phantoms, affiliate of the Philadelphia Flyers, it was as close to a battle of Prince George as one could get as defenceman Brandon Manning plays for the Phantoms.
"I think I played him nine times a year in junior and played him three times in the last two weeks," said Connolly, regarding the fact Manning played for the Chilliwack Bruins in the WHL. "It's nice to see another person from Prince George doing so well and playing at this level."
It may be nice, but Connolly admits there's always an extra incentive when the Crunch play the Phantoms.
"Whenever you're playing a friend and a guy you've grown up with you never want to lose," said Connolly. "When me and Brandon are out there it's game on, we have fun with it but it's very competitive for sure."
