All good things come to an end.
And so it is with the Kitchener Rangers' unbeaten streak at the Aud which concluded with a 4-3 loss to the London Knights Sunday.
Nine games it lasted. A new one starts afresh Friday.
Lots of buzz around the East Avenue bunch as of late.
First, some good news for a Monday morning. A good source state-side said Rangers draft pick Ryan MacInnis (3rd round 2012) has yet decided if he's OHL or NCAA bound next season.
MacInnis, son of former Rangers defenceman Al, is currently playing for the U.S. national development Under-17 team.
There were indications that he was leaning toward the NCAA route, but I'm told the family is still deciding what's best for his future. The feeling is that the forward could be a future first round NHL draft pick and that the OHL is the best place to raise his stock.
As for the trade market? As mentioned earlier this week, two trends exist - 1) competition is fierce since a lot of teams are looking to make deals to improve their clubs and 2) the asking prices are sky high.
Kitchener continues to get calls with requests for goalie Franky Palazzese but the club is reluctant to deal the backup netminder since future puckstopper Jack Moylan needs more seasoning.
One thing is clear from talking to a number of scouts and hockey people this week. This is not the group that is going to take the Rangers to the promise land. We're more than a third of the way into the season and this is your Kitchener squad -- one that is great at defence, amazing in between the pipes, but can't score at a pace akin to other top teams in the league.
As one source said, when you have what many believe to be the best goalie in the CHL, you have to go for it now.
To improve, the club is going to have to move assets, young assets. And that's something it has been reluctant to do in the recent past.
It was pretty telling on the weekend when Radek Faksa was sidelined and the club had to promote Josh Sterk (just a sophomore) to top line centre duties. Obviously, help down the middle is the first priority. It was also interesting to note in that game, that both OAs remained on the fourth line. If you can't plug your OAs into holes when your stars are out, that's a concern.
Major change could be en route. One source pointed out that there is a chance that 4-5 kids may not be on this team by the post-season.
Let's keep in mind that the club will be without coach Steve Spott, Tobias Rieder, Radek Faksa and John Gibson, and possibly Ryan Murphy and Matt Puempel for six games in December because of the world junior hockey championships.
That's going to leave a huge hole.
