A Brief History of Time

The Rovers recent 2-2 tie with the Kitchener Mounties was the 300th game in the still short history of the team. Since their inception, the club has posted a regular-season record of 136-130-34, as well as a 26-15 mark in the playoffs where the team has won six of seven playoff series and one Kings Cup championship in RHL13.

Assistant captain Sean Hill remains as the only player still with the team from their expansion draft (the team signed expansion draftee Cale Hulse as a free agent this year after two seasons away from the team), while David Legwand, acquired in the RHL11 preseason, has played 297 of the team's 300 regular season games. Legwand, Hill, and assistant Olli Jokinen are the only three players still with the team that suited up in all five Rover campaigns.

Pavol Demitra, acquired in the RHL12 preseason, recently scored his 100th goal as a Rover and leads the team in goals (100), assists (134), and points (234). Demitra, Murray, and Jokinen figure most prominently among the franchise scoring leaders with one of the three leading almost all regular season (Demitra) and playoff (Murray, Jokinen) scoring categories. Kim Johnsson has established himself as the leading scorer among defenseman in his three seasons with the club, being the only blueliner to crack 100 points with the franchise thus far.

The club has used goaltender by committee in their formative years, with Ed Belfour being their first marquee netminder (RHL12-13), then Roman Cechmanek coming in to lead during the two finals appearances (RHL13-14), and now Martin Gerber taking over this season. Cechmanek still leads in games played, wins, and shutouts, but Gerber's half-season numbers place him first in franchise GAA and sv. pct. The goaltending may be in for another shakeup in the future as the club expects their first ever draft pick, RHL11 first overall Kari Lehtonen, to debut in RHL17 and challenge for the #1 job.

So what does the man in charge think of the first 300 games? "Really, if anyone had told me that by season five we'd have a championship, another finals appearance, and would be in first place right now, well, I'd have had them committed", GM Stringer said in exclusive sit-down with Rover Report. "Obviously things have gone way better than anyone could have expected, but all winning a championship early in our history does is make our fans expect us to win again.. and that's exactly what we want. We want our fans to believe that we can win every year; that's what makes it exciting. They keep us on our toes and doing the best job possible every year. The only way to follow up winning is to keep winning, so that's what we want to do here.. this year, and every year. Now it might not always happen, but as long as the fans can see an exciting product and a clear vision for the future, then we'll be doing the right thing".