OHL Alumni Central

Ontario Hockey League grad Wes Goldie is closing in fast on ECHL history. Goldie started out the season second all-time for goals scored in the league. He is still in second, behind Rod Taylor, but has moved within 17 goals of overtaking Taylor for the all-time lead. Wes began the 2011-12 ECHL season with 335 goals while Taylor retired at 368. 34 games into the season, Goldie has increased his total by 17 for 352.

Considering Wes has scored between 40 and 50 goals in each of his past five seasons, a 34 goal season in 2011-12 is certainly achievable. Goldie’s ECHL high came in 2008-09 with the Victoria Salmon Kings when he recorded 48 goals. Last season with the Alaska Aces, he led the league with 46 goals. His career high came in 2004-05 while playing for Sorel-Tracy in Quebec’s LNAH with 57 goals in 59 games. Back in 1998-99, he scored 46 in the Ontario Hockey League with the Owen Sound Platers.

Goldie played four full seasons in the Ontario Hockey League with the Platers from 1996-97 to 1999-00. He appeared in two games with the London Knights in 1995-96. Undrafted, he played four years in the ECHL before a two year stint in the Quebec league. He returned to the ECHL for the 2006-07 season with Victoria. He played four years with the Salmon Kings and was captain for the final two seasons. Wes has been with the Alaska Aces since the start of the 2010-11 season.

This season, Goldie is tied for ninth in the ECHL with 36 points. He has also made strides up the ECHL all-time points list. He started the season in 17th place and is now just a handful of points away from cracking the top ten. He’s also a bit of an ironman, missing a few games this season for the first time since rejoining the league in 2006.

The Aces are ripping up the ECHL in 2011-12. The team currently has a 15 point lead in their division and have a 13 point cushion between them and the next best team in the league. Alaska is the reigning Kelly Cup champion and Wes Goldie is the reigning ECHL Most Valuable Player.

Five members of the London Knights coaching staff and front office began their playing careers in the OHL and have come back to give back to the league that developed them. Three of the five played their Ontario Hockey League (OHA, OMJHL, OHL – it’s all the same…) careers with London.

Dale Hunter has left his post as the head coach of the London Knights for the same position with the National Hockey League’s Washington Capitals. However, he remains president and co-owner of the Knights. Hunter played in the OHL for three seasons from 1977-78 to 1979-80. He played his first season with the Kitchener Rangers and the following two with the Sudbury Wolves. In his second season, he totaled 110 points in 59 games with the Wolves.

Dale was a second round pick of the Quebec Nordiques at the 1979 NHL Entry Draft, 41st overall. From 1980-81 to 1998-99, Hunter played 1,409 regular season NHL games with the Nordiques, Washington Capitals and Colorado Avalanche. He was captain of the Capitals from 1994-95 to 1998-99 and his number 32 is one of just four Washington Capitals retired numbers. Hunter was head coach of the Knights from 2001-02 until the fall of 2011 when he replaced Bruce Boudreau behind the Capitals bench.

Mark Hunter is general manager, vice-president, co-owner and, now, head coach of the London Knights. Mark played two seasons in the Ontario Hockey League, 1979-80 and 1980-81, with the Brantford Alexanders. In 119 OHL regular season games, Hunter totaled 168 points. He was selected seventh overall at the 1981 NHL Entry Draft by the Montreal Canadiens. Mark has been general manager of the Knights since 2000-01.

Mark played 628 regular season NHL games from 1981-82 to 1992-93 with the Canadiens, St. Louis Blues, Calgary Flames, Hartford Whalers and Washington Capitals. In 1985-86, Hunter scored 44 goals with the St. Louis Blues. He was part of the 1988-89 Calgary Flames Stanley Cup winning team.

Basil McRae co-owns the Knights with the Hunter Brothers. McRae played three seasons with the Knights from 1978-79 to 1980-81. Basil was a fifth round pick of the Quebec Nordiques at the 1980 NHL Entry Draft, 87th overall. He played in 576 NHL regular season games from 1981-82 to 1992-93 with the Nordiques, Toronto Maple Leafs, Detroit Red Wings, Minnesota North Stars, Tampa Bay Lightning, St. Louis Blues and Chicago Blackhawks.

Basil sits 24th all-time in career penalty minutes in the NHL. He sat out 2,457 minutes over his career. In 1989-90, with the Minnesota North Stars, McRae led the NHL in penalty minutes with 351.

Dylan Hunter, son of Dale, played five seasons with London from 2001-02 to 2005-06 and was team captain in his final two seasons. In 315 Ontario Hockey League games, Hunter contributed 369 points. He was a major factor in the Knights becoming Memorial Cup champions in 2004-05.

Dylan was taken by the Buffalo Sabres in the ninth round of the 2004 NHL Entry Draft, 273rd overall. He spent five years splitting time between the AHL and ECHL. He last played in 2010-11 with the Cincinnati Cyclones of the ECHL and the Milwaukee Admirals of the AHL. This is his first year behind the bench.

Rob Ramage starred with the Knights for three seasons from 1975-76 to 1977-78, co-winning the Max Kaminsky Trophy with Brad Marsh in his final season. After a year in the World Hockey Association with the Birmingham Bulls in 1978-79, Ramage was taken first overall in the 1979 NHL Entry Draft by the Colorado Rockies.

Ramage played 1,044 regular season NHL games from 1979-80 to 1993-94 with the Rockies, St. Louis Blues, Calgary Flames, Toronto Maple Leafs, Minnesota North Stars, Tampa Bay Lightning, Montreal Canadiens and Philadelphia Flyers. He won the Stanley Cup twice, in 1988-89 with the Calgary Flames and 1992-93 with the Montreal Canadiens. Rob is in his first season as assistant coach.

As usual, the Hershey Bears are storming through the American Hockey League season, taking no prisoners. The Bears are currently in first atop the Eastern Conference and second overall in the 30 team league behind only the Oklahoma City Barons. Helping out on the blue line are two grads of the Ontario Hockey League. These are the only two representatives of the OHL on the Hershey roster, a surprise when you consider there is only one non-North American born player on the club.

Danny Richmond was coaxed out of the NCAA by Dale Hunter to play one season with the London Knights in 2003-04. Richmond came to London already a draft pick of the Carolina Hurricanes. The Canes took Danny in the second round of the 2003 NHL Entry Draft, 31st overall. He had an exceptional season with the Knights and also won gold at the World Juniors as a member of Team U.S.A.

To date, Richmond has played in 49 NHL regular season games with Carolina and the Chicago Blackhawks. Of course, as a member of the Hershey Bears, he is now property of the Washington Capitals – a team stocked with former Knights and now coached by Dale Hunter. In eight years of professional hockey, Richmond has spent the majority of his time in the AHL. He has played for nearly 25% of the league’s 30 team, seven teams in eight years.

Where Danny Richmond was an American playing junior in Canada, Patrick McNeill was a Canadian playing junior in the United States. McNeill was a member of the Saginaw Spirit for four seasons from 2003-04 to 2006-07. Where Richmond is a bit of a hockey vagabond, McNeill was drafted by the Washington Capitals and has only played with their minor league affiliates since turning pro.

Patrick was a D-man with a nose for the opposing team’s net while in the OHL. In each of his final two seasons in Saginaw, he surpassed the 20 goal plateau. His 77 points in 2005-06 led all the Ontario Hockey League’s defensemen. It should be noted that McNeill was the first overall pick by the Spirit at the 2003 OHL Priority Selection.

McNeill was a fourth round pick of the Capitals at the 2005 NHL Entry Draft, 118th overall. Other than 19 games with the ECHL’s South Carolina Stingrays in his first pro season, he has been a mainstay with the Hershey Bears. For two consecutive years, 2008-09 and 2009-10, he helped the Bears win the Calder Cup as AHL playoff champs. The team is certainly headed in the same direction this season.

Over the past four decades, from 1970 to 2009, 13 teams from the Ontario Hockey League have gone on to become Memorial Cup champions. In the first decade, the league was represented by four champs and each of the following three, three OHL teams won the top prize.

The following four articles describe in a bit of detail, the OHL’s winning teams in each decade.

1970′s

In the 1970’s, the Memorial Cup became strict property of major junior hockey in Canada. Previously, the format had potentially included any ‘Junior A’ team in the country. Four times during the decade, a team from Ontario was victorious at the Memorial Cup tournament. Each year, one team from each of the three major junior leagues in Canada competed for the ultimate prize. Interestingly, in each of the Ontario victories, the Ontario representative played possum in the round robin, winning one and losing one. In fact, three of the four years, all three teams ended the round robin with 1 and 1 records. Read more

1980′s

With the champions of three league’s competing each year for the Memorial Cup (plus one additional team from the host league), over a decade the odds are that each league will win three times. For the Ontario Hockey League during the 1980’s, it was just that. Interestingly, the Cornwall Royals won the Memorial Cup in 1980 and 1981 but didn’t move from the QMJHL to the OHL until the following season. Read more

1990′s

Each year, the champions from each of the three leagues that make up the Canadian Hockey League meet to determine Canada’s top major junior hockey team. The host league of the Memorial Cup enters two teams to make it a four team tournament. In the 1990’s, three teams from the Ontario Hockey League were crowned Memorial Cup champions. Each year during the decade that an OHL team won, it was on home turf. Interestingly, the representative from the QMJHL in each of the three seasons was the Laval / Acadie-Bathurst Titan. Read more

2000′s

Today, the Washington Capitals are seeing green and gold. Bruce Boudreau is gone as head coach and Dale Hunter fills the role that perhaps he was destined for. Hunter, who played three seasons in the Ontario Hockey League (OHJHL at the time) from 1977-78 to 1979-80 with the Kitchener Rangers and Sudbury Wolves, has been the head coach of the London Knights since the 2001-02 season. His blue line in Washington should be familiar with three London Knights grads, two who played for Dale.

Hunter is somewhat of a legend in Washington, where his number 32 has hung from the rafters since 2000. Dale’s is just one of four Washington Capitals retired numbers. He played twelve of his nineteen National Hockey League seasons in a Capitals uniform and was team captain for his final five. He was originally a second round pick of the Quebec Nordiques at the 1979 NHL Entry Draft. He played with the Nordiques from 1980-81 to 1986-87.

Dale is second to just Tiger Williams on the NHL’s all-time penalty minutes list. His 3,565 PIM in 1,409 regular season games certainly stand out. However, often overlooked is the 323 goals and 1,020 points he accumulated over that time.

John Erskine played for the Knights before the Hunter era began. For three seasons, from 1997-98 to 1999-00, he was the backbone of London’s defense. In his final season with the Knights, he was a CHL All-Star and won the Max Kaminsky Trophy as the Ontario Hockey League’s best defenseman.

Originally a second round pick of the Dallas Stars at the 1998 NHL Entry Draft, Erskine has been with the Capitals since 2006-07. Along the way, he has played for the Stars and the New York Islanders.

Like Dale Hunter, Dennis Wideman played for the Sudbury Wolves. Dennis began his five year Ontario Hockey League career with the Wolves in 1999-00. He was traded to London midway through the 2000-01 season. Like Erskine, Dennis was a CHL All-Star (2003-04). Wideman was an eighth round pick of the Buffalo Sabres in 2002. He never played for Buffalo but has put on the jersey’s of the St. Louis Blues, Boston Bruins and Florida Panthers before coming to Washington near the end of the 2010-11 season.

John Carlson played just one season in the Ontario Hockey League with London in 2008-09. In just 59 games, he totalled 76 points from the blue line and his 60 assists were the most by any OHL rookie. He came to London already a Washington prospect. The Capitals took Carlson in the first round of the 2008 NHL Entry Draft. After spending most of 2009-10 with the AHL’s Hershey Bears, 2010-11 was John’s first full season with the Capitals.