OHL Alumni Central

The Cincinnati Cylcones of the East Coast Hockey League will try and improve on their seventh place finish in the eleven team Eastern Conference during the 2010-11 season. The Cyclones will have two Ontario Hockey League grads behind the bench for the 2011-12 season.

Jarrod Skalde is entering his second season as head coach of the Cyclones after two years coaching the Bloomington Prairie Thunder of the IHL. Skalde played four seasons in the Ontario Hockey League from 1987-88 to 1990-91. He played his first three seasons with the Oshawa Generals then was traded early in his final season to the Belleville Bulls. In his 40 games with Belleville, he produced at more than a 2 points per game pace.

Jarrod was selected by the New Jersey Devils in the second round of the 1989 NHL Entry Draft, 26th overall. In a professional playing career that lasted from 1991-92 until 2007-08, Skalde totalled 115 NHL games with the Devils, Anaheim Mighty Ducks, Calgary Flames, San Jose Sharks, Dallas Stars, Chicago Blackhawks, Atlanta Thrashers and Philadelphia Flyers (115 total games in eight NHL jerseys – gotta be some kind of record?!).

Skalde spent most of his time in the AHL and IHL with European stints that took him to Switzerland, Sweden and Austria.

Andrew Cassels will join Jarrod Skalde behind the Cincinnati Cyclones bench for 2011-12 as assistant coach. Cassels starred with the Ottawa 67′s from 1986-87 to 1988-89. In his middle season, he was awarded the Eddie Powers Memorial Trophy as the Ontario Hockey League’s top scorer with 151 points. In 1988-89, he dropped to third in the league with 134 points.

Cassels was the 17th overall pick at the 1987 NHL Entry Draft, going to the Montreal Canadiens. Andrew played somewhat sparingly with the Habs over his first two years of pro hockey. He became an NHL regular after being traded to the Hartford Whalers for the start of the 1991-92 season. Andrew’s NHL career lasted until 2005-06 and he played in 1015 regular season games with Montreal, Hartford, Calgary Flames, Vancouver Canucks, Columbus Blue Jackets and Washington Capitals.

Because of his unfortunate selection of NHL teams, Cassels played in just 21 games over three playoff seasons during his 16 year NHL career. He played eight in his second year with Montreal, seven the following year with Hartford and six in 2001-02 with the Canucks.

As mentioned in the last post at OHL Alumni Central, the Cincinnati Cyclones have signed bad-boy Ontario Hockey League grad, Michael Liambas. Skalde has experience with Liambas, having coached him with the Bloomington Prairie Thunder.

Love him or hate him (if you’re a Kitchener Rangers fan, I’m sure it’s still hate), hockey life goes on for Ontario Hockey League grad Michael Liambas. Quite frankly, Todd Bertuzzi is guilty of a far more heinous and malicious crime and hockey fans seem to have forgiven him just fine. Although, I doubt the Moore family has.

Liambas will suit up for the Cincinnati Cyclones of the East Coast Hockey League for 2011-12 after finishing out the 2010-11 season with the ECHL club. Mike completed a season with the University of British Columbia Thunderbirds of the CIS and had time leftover for the final 15 games of Cincinnati’s schedule, as well as, four games in the Kelly Cup playoffs.

Mike played parts of four seasons in the Ontario Hockey League from 2006-07 to 2009-10, all with the Erie Otters. He was banished from the league just four games into the 2009-10 season after his controversial hit on Ben Fanelli of the Kitchener Rangers.

Previous to his stint with the Thunderbirds, Liambas played 25 games over two seasons with the Bloomington Prairie Thunder of the ill-fated IHL.

Check out Michael Liambas’ profile at the official Cincinnati Cyclones website.

Speaking of the Cincinnati Cyclones, stay tuned for the next article at OHL Alumni Central featuring the coaching staff of the team. OHL grad Jarrod Skalde is entering his second year as head coach and OHL great Andrew Cassels will be in his first year as assistant coach.

Ontario Hockey League grad Nate Kiser began play with the Plymouth Whalers the season after yesterday’s featured player, Jason Ward, finished up his OHL career in Plymouth. Kiser played four seasons with the Whalers from 1999-00 to 2002-03.

In his first season with Plymouth, the Whalers pushed the Barrie Colts to the seventh game of the Robertson Cup finals.

Nate was selected by the Phoenix Coyotes in the fifth round of the 2000 NHL Entry Draft, 160th overall. With exception of eleven games in the AHL, Kiser has spent all his professional hockey career in the East Coast Hockey League. Seven of those eight seasons have been in a South Carolina Stingrays jersey.

The Stingrays lost in the ECHL’s American Conference Finals in 2007-08 to Cincinnati. The following season, South Carolina won the Kelly Cup with a four games to three victory over the Alaska Aces.

Kiser currently sits in third place on the Stingrays all-time list for games played. On the team’s all-time penalty minutes list, Nate is in second.

Check out Nate Kiser’s profile page on the South Carolina Stingrays official website.

Ontario Hockey League grad Jeremy Akeson was recently given a new chance to participate in the ECHL playoffs for the 2010-11 season. Akeson began the season with the Trenton Devils. The Devils are in last place in the ECHL’s Eastern Conference and an impossible distance from the eighth and final playoff spot. His new team, the Wheeling Nailers are poised to take one of the final playoff seeds in the East.

Akeson played four seasons in the Ontario Hockey League from 2001-02 to 2004-05, all with the Ottawa 67′s. Twice with Ottawa, Jeremy played in the Robertson Cup finals to decide the playoff champion of the OHL. Twice, the 67′s were defeated in the final. In 2002-03, they were beat out by the Kitchener Rangers and in 2004-05, they fell to the London Knights. Both the Rangers and the Knights went on to win the Memorial Cup in those seasons.

Because of the timing of his career in Ottawa, Akeson played nearly a full season’s worth of games over his four seasons due to Ottawa’s playoff success. Jeremy graduated with 63 playoff games under his belt.

After leaving the Ontario Hockey League, Akeson chose the Canadian University route. Jeremy played three seasons with St. Francis Xavier University.

2010-11 was Jeremy’s third season with the ECHL’s Trenton Devils and he wore an ‘A’ on his jersey this season through 54 games before being traded. His top offensive season in the ECHL to date was his first when he scored 17 and added 25 assists for 42 points in 60 games.

Check out Jeremy Akeson’s profile on the ECHL official website.

Thanks to the Inside The Trenton Devils website for the above picture.

Ontario Hockey League grad Mike Wilson has played just seven games over the past four seasons. After not playing for the first half of the 2010-11 season, Wilson has been picked up by the Toledo Walleye of the ECHL and has one goal in his first two games with the club.

Wilson played three seasons in the Ontario Hockey League from 1992-93 to 1995-96, all with the Sudbury Wolves. In his final season, he contributed 47 points from the blue line in 64 regular season games. The Wolves made it to the Robertson Cup semi-finals that season before losing to the Detroit Junior Red Wings in seven games. He was selected to the CHL All-Rookie Team in his first season.

Mike was taken by the Vancouver Canucks in the first round of the 1993 NHL Entry Draft, 20th overall. The Canucks traded his rights in the summer of 1996 to the Buffalo Sabres as part of the deal that brought Alexander Mogilny to Vancouver and placed Mike Peca in a Sabres uniform.

Wilson has played a total of 336 regular season games in the NHL with Buffalo, the Florida Panthers, Pittsburgh Penguins and New York Rangers. He was a part of Buffalo’s 1998 team that made it to the Eastern Conference finals.

Beginning with the 2004-05 NHL lockout season, Wilson spent two seasons playing in several locations in Europe. Mike played games for teams in Norway, Austria, Switzerland and Finland.

After taking 2006-07 and 2007-08 off, Wilson played five games with the ECHL’s Trenton Devils in 2008-09, with an additional five games in the playoffs. He played just two games with the Toledo Walleye in 2009-10.

Check out Mike Wilson’s profile page at the Toledo Walleye official website.

Check out these previous articles on Wilson’s teammates with the Sudbury Wolves:

Jamie Rivers

Zdenek Nedved