Reading’s season from hell finally comes to a merciful end

READING , PA – Before the season started, the Reading Royals changed affiliates, changed head coaches, and changed over 80 percent of the roster that lost in the second round of the ECHL North Division playoffs in 2008.

That a difference a year makes, huh? The 2008-09 version of the Reading turned out to be not only the worst season in team history, but one of the worst seasons in league history. The Royals ended this season with a record of 24-42-0-3 (54 points). The Royals 2001-02 season ended with 27 wins and 63 points.
 
Let’s look at some of the good, the bad, and the down right ugly that made up this year’s Reading Royals season from hell.
 
The Good
 
1) Rich Peverley and Jonathan Quick – You might be asking yourself, why bring up two players that didn’t play a minute for the Royals all season long? Well, two of the feel good stories for Royals fans are the careers of both players who are currently playing in the NHL.
 
Peverley, who played for the Royals in the 2005-06 season, is currently playing with the Atlanta Thrashers in the NHL. Prior to this season he played for the Milwaukee Admirals and the Nashville Predators, but now he is getting noticed around the league for having helped the Thrashers offense ever since he came on the scene and now has 12 goals and 20 assists and will make the team next season out of training camp.
 
Quick, a third round pick of the Los Angeles Kings in 2005, is sharing time in the Kings net with Erik Ersberg. Not only has Ersberg outplayed Ersberg, but he allowed the Kings to move Jason Labarbera to the Vancouver Canucks. Quick has a 2.54 goals against average (GAA) and a .911 save percentage. Not bad for a rookie.
 
While most people are considering Steve Mason as the leading candidate for the Calder Trophy for rookie-of-the-year, along with the Predators Pekke Rinne, Quick is third behind both in wins with 19, GAA, save percentage, and he has a record over .500. Not bad for being on a team that’s going to miss the playoffs.
 
2) The fans – The team averaged 5,005 fans per night, good for seventh in the league. Not bad when you consider this is the worst season in team history, and it is the worst attendance numbers the team has had in franchise history.   When the team rebounds next season, you can bet they will do much better that the five thousand a night they drew this season.
 
With the AHL’s Philadelphia Phantoms looking for a new home, and giving serious consideration Allentown, Pa as their new home, someone at Comcast-Spectacor (AKA, Peter Luukko) might want to reconsider that move. Reading, Pa is only an hour away from Philadelphia and Allentown is more than an hour away.
 
(Are you listing Phantoms?)
 
3) Larry Courville – This year, nothing went right for the Royals except firing than Head Coach Jason Nobili after the team went 9-23-2 at the beginning of the season. F ormer Royal Larry Courville took over the reigns as Head Coach and went 15-19-4 the rest of the season. While no one will do cartwheels over a below .500 record, keep in mind that the team was still made up mostly of players Nobili brought in.
 
“I’m really excited to see what he can do with a team that he’s put together that’s his team,” Royals GM Gordon Kaye told the Reading Eagle. “What particularly excites me is Larry is part of our family.”
 
“I think the thing that ultimately swayed me in the direction of making this decision now is, I’m sure we’re not going to do better,” Kaye said.
 
“It means a lot,” Courville said. “It’s something I’ve always wanted. I’m looking forward to being here next year, and hopefully it leads to some more years after this.”
 
Courville, 34, was a finalist for the head coaching job last summer, but was passed over due to his lack of coaching experience. Courville was brought in to be Nobili’s assistant once the team got off to such a slow start in December.
Courville is one of the good guys, and the fact that he is a fan favorite will go a long way to smoothing fan relations for next season.
 
4) The power play – despite the lack of scoring, the Royals had the 15^th best power play unit, but it was still just below middle of the pack. Still, it was one of the few bright spots on the team.
 
The Bad
 
1) One reason for the team’s poor season was due in part to former head coach Karl Taylor leaving in the off-season. Taylor took some of his best players with him to Ontario when he took over the head coaching job with the Ontario Reign, the new ECHL affiliate of the LA Kings, where the team finished in first place in the Pacific Division.
 
The Reign won without be benefit of a top 20 scorer, but had solid defense and an excellent rookie goaltender in Jeff Zatkoff. Enough said.
2) The Royals lose the Kings as an affiliate and gain the Toronto Maple Leafs – All you need to know about how well the two teams have drafted quality NHL prospects over the years is that according to HOCKEYSFUTURE.COM, the Kings are second overall, while the Leafs are 17^th.
 
The Royals had two goaltending prospects on the team, one Leaf, one Kings. The Leafs did send goaltender Jamie Reimer down to the Royals but struggled mightily for most of the season as did Kings prospect Danny Taylor.
 
According to the Leafs web site, those were the only prospects, but Tyler Doig was sent down to the Royals from the Leafs AHL affiliate, the Toronto Marlies and was the teams leading scorer with 59 points on 18 goals and 41 assists.   Unfortunately for the Royals that is where the good news ends.
 
The Ugly
 
1) The team was poorly constructed from day one.
 
Question: What do you get when you build a team that can’t score, can’t defend, and does not have a quality goaltender? You got it. You get the worst season in franchise history. This years Royals were the second worst offense in franchise history (211) and the second worst in goals allowed (269).
 
Oddly enough, Royals General Manager Gordon Kaye stated recently in the Reading Eagle that the team looked as though it had a chance to win a title.
 
“I thought that we had a championship-caliber team from a recruiting standpoint at the beginning of the season, and the pieces didn’t fit well together, we got off to a slow start. We did all the things that we can’t afford to do here in Reading.”
 
The problem, however, was that this years version of the Royals were not even close to being a playoff team, much less a Cup contending team. As a member of the media, we receive the press releases that show who the Royals signed in the off-season. The one major factor that we look at when a team is being constructed is: Who on this team is going to score?
 
Oddly enough, as each press release came into our hot, little hands, the exact same question was being asked of the team that we asked of last season’s team that struggled at the beginning of last season when the team got off to a slow start due in large part because the team couldn’t score.
 
Fortunately for last season’s team, Kaye and Taylor made moves to quickly correct the situation. As it turns out, the signings and trades helped turn the Royals season around. Not only did the team make the playoffs, they had their second best season ever in terms of how far they went in the playoffs (second round).
 
Unfortunately, the correct adjustments couldn’t be made in time after the team had dug itself a hole in the standings. Most anything they tried didn’t work, and as usual the team was hit hard by injuries and call-ups.
 
2) Defense and special teams – The team had virtually no offense from the blueline. On defense Tim Branham has only 1 goal and 25 assists since signing coming over from the now defunct Augusta Lynx.   Steve Ward had 6 goals and 19 assists but was on the team for only half the season.
 
The 269 goals allowed were at league worst, as was the penalty killing unit which was also dead last in the league. Enough said.
 
So take heart Royals fans, the season is over. In the mean time you can root for the Ontario Reign since it seems as though the Reign is made up of players that probably would have been on the Royals had Taylor and company stayed in Reading.
 
And don’t forget, the Hershey Bears (AHL) play an hour from Reading and are tied for the best record in the AHL, and could be in line for their 10^th Calder Cup title.
 
The Philadelphia Phantoms (AHL) have come out of no where to be in position to make the last playoff spot in the Bears division. Those two teams could be meeting each other for the last time in Phantoms history, so now you have a good excuse to go to the games.
 
Than of course there are the Philadelphia Flyers who should make the NHL playoffs any day now, and the World Champion Philadelphia Phillies regular season has officially started so you also have that to look forward too.
 
So cheer up Royals fans, as they always say, just wait until next year. Things can’t get any worst than they did this year. Trust me.
 
Contact the author at Brian.Jennings@prohockeynews.com
Contact the photographer at lewis.bleiman@prohockeynews.com