Laval Rocket: Modern takeaways from the 2006-07 Hamilton Bulldogs

With the AHL season now cancelled due to COVID-19, I believe the Laval Rocket can learn something from the last Montreal Canadiens AHL champ, the 2007 Hamilton Bulldogs.

It was a beautiful 2 on 1 that saw the Montreal Canadiens AHL affiliate win the championship.

Picture this. It’s game 5 of the 2007 Calder Cup finals, and a pesky Hamilton Bulldogs squad led by coach Don Lever was up 3-1 on the Hershey Bears. With a long line of Calder Cup Success, the Bears had finished 1st in the AHL with 114 points.

Yet, on a Hershey powerplay with the game tied 1-1 with 10 minutes left in the 3rd period, bears forward Tomas Fleischmann’s attempted to forward a pass to the far post. Bulldogs forward Maxim Lapierre blocked it in front and took off. For many Canadiens fans, Lapierre is a familiar face, with the pesky forward eventually making the Habs full time after his rookie season in Hamilton, recording a career-high 15 goals in 2008-09.

To his left was his complete opposite, forward Ajay Baines, an undrafted AHL journeyman who had spent the previous 6 seasons with the Norfolk Admirals. Known as a tough, bottom-six center, he wasn’t exactly known as an offensive powerhouse, yet found himself on a 2 on 1 with Lapierre, a 2nd round pick and promising prospect in the Canadiens organization.

"“I don’t even know how he kept up with me,” Lapierre said in an interview with The Hamilton Spectator. “He was the hardest worker, by far, but we always joke that for an old guy, he was pretty fast that night.”"

Facing now NHL mainstay and former star Mike Green, Lapierre made a cross-ice pass to Baines as Green tried to cut off his path to the net. With a backchecking Fleischmann wrapped around him, Baines blindly swung at the puck before crashing into the boards. “I just heard the crowd,” Baines said.

To quote former Bulldogs announcer Derek Wills. “Wow, what a goal!”

That turned out to be the final dagger, as the Bulldogs killed off the remaining time, winning their first Calder Cup in franchise history. To date, it’s the last time a Canadiens minor league affiliate has won a championship. Following this, Hamilton made 2 more conference finals appearance, before the Canadiens moved their affiliation to St. Johns and now Laval.

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In that 5-year period, the IceCaps/Rocket made the playoffs once, when St. Johns snuck in on the final game of the season in 2016-17. The Rocket endured a dreadful 2017-18 season that ended with a 12-game losing streak, a middling 2018-19 season plagued by a lack of offense, to this season. Despite their early struggles, the Rocket had a 30-24 record to their name, riding a 4-game win streak, before the season was put on hold and eventually cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Needless to say, 1 playoff appearance in 5 years isn’t a great track record, and though this season looked hopeful, that’s all it’ll be, hopeful. The Rocket simply have to look to next year and build a team that can be as competitive from the get-go as they were recently.

Cue, the Hamilton Bulldogs.

Much like any good NHL team, a good AHL team has to have a similar amount of thought put into it, and the trickle-down effect that comes from professional sports applies in this regard. Good NHL teams aren’t built from a select few talented players and a wash of lesser struggling AHL middle six or bottom-six players. Most NHL teams, the Canadiens included, have a mentality to simply stick a few talented AHL forwards that didn’t make the team out of training camp, and fill the rest of the team with undrafted free agents and fringe AHL players. This formula usually doesn’t work, as these undrafted free agents are undrafted for a reason, and typically need more time to adapt to the AHL game than a 2nd, 3rd, or even 5th round pick.

I’ve talked about this kind of player before in my article on Aaron Luchuk, and AHL teams can’t be built utilizing these players primarily. Nor can they be built with AHL stars primarily, players who aren’t good enough for the NHL, but have the ability to produce at a lower level. The 2006-07 Bulldogs are a good example of the perfect mix, having legitimate prospects like Maxim Lapierre and even Carey Price (though he could be considered an exception to the rule being a 5th overall pick), proven AHL talents like Corey Locke and Dan Jancevski, and then role players like Ajay Baines.

By creating this mix of prospects, proven talents, and veteran journeyman, you’re able to adapt to multiple situations and have a team that flows smoothly and isn’t relying on one aspect of its game or another. This is how you build good hockey teams, and it’s a shame how most NHL GMs simply chuck a few fringe players and prospects and call it a day.

How do you think a player like Lapierre and Price would’ve turned out had they not had players like Baines and goalie Yann Danis there to offer some veteran presence? These guys have been around for a while and should be utilized with that experience and veteran presence in mind.

Of course, it’s hard to predict how the Rocket or AHL hockey, in general, will look next year, but players like Yannick Veilleux and Cayden Primeau offer some hope of another return to AHL glory, and maybe another beautiful, 2 on 1.