Mike Hawes comes right out and says it. Sometimes, wheeling and dealing is tough on him.
After all, when he goes through the annual summertime ritual of revamping his roster for the upcoming season, he's not just swapping hockey cards with a buddy. With the moves he makes, he's impacting the lives and playing careers of real people -- guys who have quite literally bled for the betterment of the Prince George Spruce Kings.
But, like all other general managers, Hawes has the ability to seal off his emotions and do what needs to be done to keep his team as competitive as possible. And he absolutely loves assembling the individual pieces that eventually form his club, the northernmost entry in the B.C. Hockey League.
And yes, there are times when he wakes up in the middle of the night, brought out of his slumber by potential roster moves that have been percolating in his brain.
"No matter what time of day or where I'm at, I'm always running that depth chart through my head," he said. "I always have an idea of what I want to do and a plan. I go to bed thinking about the depth chart and wake up thinking about it, but it is fun. I do enjoy it -- I wouldn't be doing it otherwise."
With Hawes at the controls, the current Spruce Kings roster bears little resemblance to the one iced at the end of the 2012-13 campaign, which concluded March 20 with a first-round playoff loss to the Chilliwack Chiefs. Twelve guys are gone -- either through graduation from junior hockey, trades or outright release -- and have so far been replaced by nine newcomers and by local forward Braiden Epp, who made an impressive BCHL debut in that five-game series against the Chiefs. Players who are now BCHL graduates are forwards Coltyn Hansen, Cameron Lawson and Shayne Morrissey, blueliners Mark Begert, Trevor Esau and Kevin Guiltinan and goaltender Kirk Thompson. All will be playing college or university hockey this coming season. Traded away, meanwhile, were forwards David Stephens (Pictou County Weeks Crushers) and Jace Hennig (Coquitlam Express) and defenceman Spencer Schoech (OCN Blizzard), while forward Lyndon Martell and goalie Liam McLeod were set free to pursue other opportunities, Martell potentially in Canadian Interuniversity Sport and McLeod with the Kamloops Blazers of the Western Hockey League.
And those nine new additions? They are forwards Brent Lashuk, Max McHugh and Cole Todd, defenders Luke Formica, Christian Weidauer, Caleb Thompson and Danny Kiraly and a pair of goaltenders, Alex Murray and Jesse Jenks.
Last summer, Hawes was forced to remake the Kings in similar fashion because he lost his top 10 point-getters from the year before. The GM did an admirable job in finding replacement parts and his club surprised many observers by compiling a 25-22-1-8 record. Early in the season, the Spruce Kings even cracked the top-20 in the national rankings when they went on a six-game winning streak and sat at 11-4-1-1 overall.
Hawes, who signed a two-year contract extension in March, appears to have worked his magic again. Making predictions is risky business, but Lashuk and McHugh seem to have great offensive upside and Todd is a proven winner who joins the Kings after helping the Vancouver Northwest Giants to championship titles the past two seasons in the B.C. Major Midget League.
Hawes's most compelling acquisitions are the first two blueliners mentioned above, Formica and Weidauer, and the two goalies, Murray and Jenks.
At six-foot-six and 210 pounds, the 19-year-old Formica is a Michigan-born beast who will play a shutdown role in his own zone. This past season, he had no trouble filling a jersey for the Carleton Place Canadians of the Central Canada Hockey League. The 19-year-old Weidauer, meanwhile, was also a member of the Canadians. He excels at the other end of the rink, having recorded 83 points in the past three seasons. Murray, 20, went 19-13-1 as a puckstopper with the Burlington Cougars last year in the Ontario Junior Hockey League and the 18-year-old Jenks was the main man between the pipes for the South Island Royals of the BCMML. Back on March 8, the six-foot-two Jenks showcased his ample talents when he almost beat the Cariboo Cougars all by himself in the first game of a best-of-three playoff series. That afternoon, in a contest held at the Coliseum, he faced 53 shots and made 49 saves during a 4-3 loss. If not for Jenks, the Cougars could have hit double digits offensively.
Heading into the new season, the question for the Spruce Kings is, will they score enough goals to win? Hansen, Lawson, Morrissey and Martell -- all departed -- were their top four forwards in 2012-13 and their production will be missed. In their absence, the Kings will need guys like Epp (29 goals, 69 points in 38 games with the Cariboo Cats last season), Bryant Christian (11 goals, 33 points in 56 BCHL games), Justin Rai (11 goals, 25 points in 40 games) and Jeremiah Luedtke (seven goals, 22 points in 48 games) to fill the net.
Training camp is a little more than a month away and Hawes still has room for a couple more bodies. He could find them at camp, or he could snare them from the 'future considerations' pool in the deals that sent Stephens to the Crushers and Schoech to the Blizzard.
Even if Hawes himself can't always sleep at night, Kings fans can rest soundly, knowing that their team is in capable and dedicated hands.
