Picture it: 2008.
The Cochrane Generals are preparing for the first round of the Heritage Junior Hockey League playoffs against the Claresholm Storm. But they’re not the powerhouses they are today – in fact, they’re third in the league, with 51 points. An average team at best … on paper.
Despite their less than stellar stats, the close friends and passionate players head into the post-season with their heads – and their hopes – high.
“We weren’t that good,” Tanner Boothby, who was with the team from 2005 to 2009, remembered this week. “We went into it with no expectations.
“We just had nothing to lose – and that’s a dangerous team to go up against.”
The Cochrane Generals pushed through to the top of the HJHL that monumental year to bring home the celebrated championship banner. They repeated the feat in 2009.
This week, teammates from those winning years re-lived their memories of those days of hockey glory.
“Looking back … it went by so quickly, but you remember so much of it,” said Evan McFeeters, a member of the 2008 team and a coach in 2009. “The thing that made us good: we were pretty much just 20 best friends playing hockey. We were such a tight-knit group … we all just cherished it, knowing that our hockey days were almost done. Every game we won meant we got to play another one.
“It sticks out in my mind – still to this day.”
Back in 2008, the Generals weathered the Storm and then faced the Medicine Hat Cubs in Round Two. They managed to overcome the Cubs and the Okotoks Bisons to take the Southern Conference.
It was then onto the finals, where the Gens faced off against the mighty Stettler Lightning. The Gens lost the first game, and pulled out a win.
Cochrane was destroyed 10-4 in Game 3, then played Game 4 at home – and squeaked out a 5-3 win to tie up the series at two a piece.
“We got trounced … a lot of people were counting us out,” McFeeters recalled of the Game 3 loss. “(After Game 4), we had one more game in Stettler for all the marbles.”
The Gens brought all they had in that Game 5, and quickly ran up the score to an impressive 5-1 after two periods. But the Lightning barreled back, and one by one, Cochrane saw their lead slip away. With five minutes left in the game, it was 5-4.
Dave Sissons, that year’s league leader in points and scoring, said it was a matter of true grit at that point to keep Stettler from overwhelming them.
“We were just hanging on for dear life,” he remembered.
“It seemed like they had seven guys out there – it was insane,” said Boothby. “They just came at us … and somehow, that fifth one just never went in.”
“We held on as best we could. We didn’t even realize the scoreboard was counting down,” recalled McFeeters. “We heard the buzzer and we were in a little bit of disbelief at first … then the happiness of the win took over.
“To this day, it’s one of the most memorable hockey moments of my life.”
The energy of such an unexpected championship win – the first in nearly 20 years for the club – propelled the Generals into the next year, with the 2009 regular season a decidedly different story than the one before.
“The first year was a learning experience, and we took that to the second year,” said McFeeters, who was now on the bench as a coach.
“I remember … we were unbeatable,” said former forward Dan McSween, who set that year’s league record for most goals in the playoffs with 17. “We were going to win – we didn’t want to regret anything.”
“That whole year, there was nothing else that we wanted to do,” echoed Boothby. “We wanted to do it again.”
Going into the 2009 post-season, the Generals sat pretty as the league’s number one seed.
McSween said he recalls the team’s seven game semi-final series against the Okotoks Bisons – which went the distance – was the war of that winning season.
“Most of my memories come from the series against Okotoks. Every game was just a battle,” he said. We were really beat up and tired after that, but we had pretty good confidence.”
Once through to the finals, the Gens walked over Stettler in a truncated three-game series and handily won the HJHL league title for the second time in a row. Each player credited the success to a full effort by everyone on the team.
“Every single person on the team contributed,” McFeeters said.
“Everybody had a role and they did it,” said Boothby, adding the back-to-back championships were definitely the highlight of his time with the Generals. “It’s one of those things – when you start as an 18-year-old, you think, ‘I’ll be playing hockey forever.’ It’s amazing how fast it goes.
“It was a great way to go out.”
As the 2008 and 2009 alumni reminisced about their own time with the Generals, each player also had thoughts for this year’s team – words of wisdom shared from one championship team to (hopefully) another.
“I would say, definitely leave your ego at the door … do your job and you’ll get there,” said Boothby.
“Never underestimate the next team,” added McSween. “Stay level-headed and stay tight.”
“The play-offs can be a wild ride. There’s going to be high points and low points,” Sissons said. “Ride the momentum of the positive ones – and try to forget about the bad ones.
“It’s about not giving up.”
