The Sea Dogs hope last year’s elimination experience will be a factor for success.
For all the X's and O's Gerard Gallant can pen up in practice, there's one lesson best taught by an opponent.
Strange as it may seem, nothing quite beats the sting of losing. For a young team on the rise like the Saint John Sea Dogs, that lesson came from the Moncton Wildcats in last year's league championship series. The young, inexperienced Sea Dogs wound up seeing the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League title whisked away by their provincial rivals.
Many of the players will tell you the painful sting of defeat still resonates and is used as a motivational tool. What they won't tell you - perhaps because they have yet to realize it - is that it was a necessary evil in pursuit of this year's championship.
The examples in sports are endless: the Edmonton Oilers were an emerging power in the early 1980s, but lost to the more experienced New York Islanders in the 1983 Stanley Cup finals. The two teams met again for the 1984 championship, this time with the Oilers emerging victorious.
Even Peyton Manning - who is considered by many as the greatest quarterback to have ever played football - had to lose to the New England Patriots twice before exorcising his demon en route to a Super Bowl in 2006.
The Sea Dogs may not be going up against their tormentors, as the Wildcats were eliminated in round one by Lewiston, but the empty, disappointing feeling from a year ago drives them, just as it did the Oilers and Manning's Indianapolis Colts.
The Sea Dogs' head coach understands it's all part of the process.
"Nobody wants to go through that, but for the most part, that's the way things work when you're a young team coming up," Gallant said. "You have to learn how to lose first.
"When you lose, you learn how to win."
There's little doubt the Sea Dogs are grasping that lesson. After finishing the regular season with 58 wins - tied for the most all-time in QMJHL history - the Sea Dogs are winners in 14 of their 16 playoff games to date.
Their playoff wins are equal to those from a year ago, but there's a different air of confidence amongst the group this year. It isn't an over-confidence or a sense of self-entitlement. It's a sense of understanding.
"Everyone remembers how we felt last year after losing in Game 6 (of the finals) and no one wants to feel that again," team captain and overage forward Mike Thomas said. "That's always in the back of our minds, knowing that we want to be on the other side of things this year."
Even on the rare occasion when the Sea Dogs do lose, they bounce back with a dominant performance, re-asserting themselves as the most talented team in the league. Gallant lamented his team's lackadaisical performance in a Game 2 loss to Gatineau in the league final. What followed was a clinic in domination in Game 3, a 5-0 rout by Saint John.
The only problem with winning each series in no more than five games so far means added time off and more possibilities for rust to creep back in.
"You get out of playoff mode a little bit and I just didn't think we were competing hard enough (in Games 1 and 2)," Gallant said. "If we can play (the way we did in Game 3) we will be successful."
No matter how successful the Sea Dogs may feel; their place in junior hockey history is already cemented. Their 119 points this season is second only to the 1978-79 Trois-Rivières Draveurs, who posted 122, the most in QMJHL history.
From the coaching staff down through the players, those within the organization insist there's no added pressure to cap this remarkable season off with a championship.
But that isn't to say they don't realize the history the team is making in the process.
"I think we know how good we are, but it really doesn't matter when you're on the ice," defenceman Eric Gelinas said. "We're a young group and we're really focused on winning this year."
"It would definitely be considered one of the best teams ever, I would think," Gallant added, with the presumption this team can capture both the league and Memorial Cup titles.
The players can feel the pens of history writing their story. But if they come off as confident, it's only because they know the disappointment in the alternative.
"Just because you were there last year and have the experience doesn't mean it's going to make any difference," Gallant said. "I really believe that most teams that do have success, you have to have some losing time first."
As history would indicate, losing is a recipe for success.
