Mitch Elliot might have played his final WHL game in Prince George last week when he came back to his hometown with the Seattle Thunderbirds.
Then again, if the Prince George Cougars make the playoffs, there's always a chance he could be back in town playing left wing for Seattle, the only team he's played for in a five-year junior hockey career.
The T-birds made their annual visit to CN Centre, winning both games - 9-7 and 2-1 (in a shootout) - which made for a celebration in the Elliot cheering section, led by his mom Heather and his father Kirk.
"It's bittersweet, I'm approaching 300 games played now and in a lot of places it'll be the last time I'll play there," said the 20-year-old Elliot. "I've had a good career and we came out of here with two wins, so that was obviously a nice way to end my little homestand. But it's kind of different when your career is coming to a close."
As much as he enjoys playing at home, Elliot was lamenting the lack of spectators at CN Centre. Crowds for both games were hovering around 1,200.
"It's nice to see friends and family come out to support me at the game," he said. "I'd like to see a little more of the community at the games. It's funny because I know P.G. loves hockey. I grew up here and can remember going to games where you could barely get a ticket and the 50-50 would be $10,000. It's tough to see the stands empty like that, I hope they can get it back on track there."
The T-birds (26-14-2-3, fourth place) ended a five-game losing streak in Prince George, which started Seattle on a four-game winning streak
Elliot, a former Cariboo Cougar midget, has played 297 regular season games and seven playoff games. All of those came in a memorable seven-game first-round series last year against the Kelowna Rockets. After missing the playoffs the previous three seasons, Elliot and the T-birds finally got a taste of the postseason and forced the heavily-favoured Rockets to come back from a three-games-to-none deficit with a 3-2 overtime win in Game 7. All but one of the seven games needed overtime to decide.
"We all got a taste of it last year and almost had Kelowna, we were just one shot away from going to the next round," said Elliot. "With that on our minds it's a lot easier to get amped up and we're really hoping to go far this year."
Scoring goals and collecting points has never been the strong suit of the six-foot-five, 217-pound Elliot, who has two goals and four points with 92 penalty minutes in 39 games this season. The reason he's lasted in the league for so long is he's a leader on and off the ice who plays the game tough and brings an honest effort every time he steps over the boards.
"I'm a power forward, I'm a big guy and I like to use my size as much as I can to intimidate teams and provide energy for my team," said Elliot. "If somebody has a problem with that or wants to take liberties with our so-called snipers, I have to step in and protect them.
"We have a pretty big blueline and we're pretty big up front and we have guys who can lay the body and we can really wear teams down that way."
The T-birds host the Tri-City Americans in their next game on Friday.
