Back in 2002, the Calgary Roughnecks began their franchise history by setting an NLL record. For goals against. The Montreal Express, another expansion team that year, scored 32 goals in the rout.
On the upside, the Roughnecks managed to iron the kinks out pretty quickly after that and went on to win their third game. They would go on to an unimpressive 4-14 record in their inaugural year, but since then, they have never missed the playoffs.
Flash forward to this season. Expectations were high coming into the 2015 season as Calgary returned virtually the entire roster, with most of them in the midst of the primes of their careers. Moreover, after getting to the Champion’s Cup in 2014 and coming within a whisker of winning their third title, the speculation was that this might be a team that can’t be stopped this year.
Instead, they lost on opening night. Then they lost in overtime in their second game—close but no cigar. But then they lost their third game, a new team record for futility to start a season.
And the losses continued to pile up. Four losses, five losses. Six losses.
Even after they finally earned their first win of the season in their seventh game, it looked like the 2015 season was going to be a complete wash-out, with the Riggers faced with missing the playoffs for the first time since that first season in 2002.
Instead, Calgary finished the season by winning five of their last 10, doing just enough to squeak past the Vancouver Stealth for the last playoff berth in the West Division.
They made the most of that playoff opportunity by putting the Colorado Mammoth away in the first round and then splitting the Edmonton Rush in the first two games of the Division Final before finally dropping the tie-breaking mini-game. But overall, for a team that looked down and out in February, getting that close to a second-straight Champion’s Cup trip has to be considered an accomplishment.
Ultimately their undoing in their last night of the playoffs looked a lot like the early part of the season. The Roughnecks defense gave up too many good scoring opportunities and when they most needed to play smart, disciplined lacrosse, a late penalty killed any momentum they might have had.
That was a big part of the story for the Roughnecks this year, as it has been for a couple years now. Bad penalties at the worst times consistently put them behind the proverbial eight-ball again and again during the regular season, especially during the slow start. Although they finished the year with the best penalty kill percentage (64.36), they were also shorthanded more than any other team (101 times). Although those two factors put together resulted in Calgary being middle of the pack for power play goals against (36, for fifth-best in the NLL), it also put them in a tough spot for converting offensive opportunities.
In spite of that, there were some very positive things to come out of the 2015 season as well. Shawn Evans was Mr. Everything for the Roughnecks this year, producing points like they were going out of style. He crushed the record for points in a season by racking up 130 and most likely earned himself his second MVP award in the last three years.
Curtis Dickson had the best year of his career, scoring 48 goals and adding 45 assists. “Superman” has seen his point totals improve in eery year of his career; it will be interesting to see just how much farther he can improve as he continues to mature as a player.
After starting goalie Mike Poulin got off to the worst start of his career, Frankie Scigliano stepped in and acquitted himself very well, posting an 11.12 goals against average on the season, good for fifth-best in the league. And when Scigliano faltered in Game 2 of the West Division Finals, Poulin took over and had arguably the greatest game of his career, giving up just two goals in three quarters of play to help force the tie-breaker. Although he was eventually beaten in the series-deciding mini-game, his performance on the night was nothing short of spectacular.
The question Mike Board and the rest of Calgary’s front office must now ask is, “What do we do for next year?” Based on the way the team ended the season, they’re still perfectly capable of winning big games and taking a run at the championship. But can they afford to keep players around who have developed a reputation for losing their cool at the wrong times and taking their team out of games?
The Roughnecks now have a few months to take stock of things and try to decide if they need to make some changes. From my perspective, it might be time to shake some things up to try to boost the team’s competitiveness. Perhaps moving a Dane Dobbie to move up in this year’s draft might be just what the team needs to take those final steps to the 2016 title.
