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pontcanna
07-07-2012, 11:25 AM
Victoria Times Colonist >Blogs >Sports

Hope a surprising choice
July 6, 2012

When the Victoria Royals announced Cameron Hope as the organization’s second general manager, in the short history of the Western Hockey League club on Friday morning, it came as a complete shock to most covering the team.

Let’s face it, it even came as a surprise to several GMs throughout the league, who readily admitted they know little of the former New York Rangers’ executive – a past vice president of hockey operations and assistant GM with the Broadway Blueshirts.

So to say the Royals went off the board in making this selection, as opposed to going to a sure thing like Doug Soetart, is more than fair.

Even Hope himself stated his shock when Royals’ owner Graham Lee came calling.

But what are we as media and you, as fans, to make of the choice?

There is little doubt that proof will ultimately be in the pudding with the new GM, who has plenty of experience in the pro game, but little in attracting and drafting junior-aged players.

“There is a unique challenge in junior hockey,” Hope admitted during a post scrum interview. “One of them is the way to build a winner is not only make sure you have a good coach, a good venue and all of those things, but you have to have a renewable source of players.

“You have to create a system of, I guess you can call it sustainable excellence. In order to do that at this level you have to have a terrific ability to identify talent and recruit players,” said the well-spoken Hope.

“In the National Hockey League you can always go get players and try to retain them through longer contracts. Here, you don’t have that luxury. You have to renew all the time.

“That intelligence gathering is really information driven and being able to bring the professionalism that you use in the NHL, in terms of gathering intelligence, in terms of the information systems and the people in place, and how they communicate with each other, I think, is critical.”

In other words, this job is a completely different animal and the Royals are taking a chance on this move as opposed to going to a WHL veteran, more familiar with the skill set.

Major junior is a completely different beast.

“It’s still hockey, putting players on the ice and having sustainable flow of talent,” Hope said. “It’s still good coaching and managing. But the way that you have to deal with saying goodbye to your players is unique.

“It creates that special challenge where you have to be sure that the systems you have in place, in terms of acquiring players and recruiting players, that you can’t take shortcuts.”

Hope readily admitted scouting the WHL was not his main job with the Rangers.

“Most of the time I was spending on the road scouting wasn’t usually out here. But every once in a while you would see the prospects and watch a lot of tape,” he said.

“My experience with it has more to do with my time in Edmonton and going to the games.”

Hope, 48, is an Edmonton native and spent last year practicing law back in the Alberta capital, after spending eight years with the Rangers. He will obviously have to rely on his scouting staff at first before creating his own book on players.

He has met with some of the Royals’ scouting staff, but not all.

The group will obviously have to collectively roll up its sleeves to make Lee’s choice prove worthy and the addition of a name coach will also go a long way towards that achievement.

Only time will tell.

“It was a real surprise. I have to tell you,” Hope said of the call he received from Lee. “I didn’t really know Graham. I knew someone had moved the team to Victoria, but that was the length of what I knew about the franchise.

“He seemed like he really wanted to take the time to let me know what the franchise was about and the more I learned about it, the more it was clear that he is committed to creating a winning team and organization.”

And now those responsibilities shift to Hope himself.