By Trevor Redden

redden on the raiders

Montgomery to set all-time mark

Feb 8, 2019 | 11:40 AM

Sean Montgomery played his first WHL regular season game back on Sept. 19, 2014 as the Raiders dropped the Saskatoon Blades 5-3 in front of 2,851 spectators at the Art Hauser Centre.

Montgomery picked up an assist on a third period goal by Dylan Stewart, and Sawyer Lange led the way with a goal and two assists.

The top song on the billboard charts was Taylor Swift’s Shake it Off, and Cory Clouston was the head coach in Prince Albert.

Fast forward four years and a few months, and Montgomery is still wearing green and gold.

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As a matter of fact, he’s worn it longer than anybody else in the 37-year history of the franchise.

Friday night in his hometown of Calgary, Montgomery will play in his 331^st game as a Prince Albert Raider, surprassing the previous record of 331 set by Brett Novak in 2006. Ahead of the record-breaking night, paNOW’s Jeff D’Andrea talked to Novak about the milestone.

Congratulations to Sean on an impressive record that could be virtually untouchable by the time the season comes to an end.

Home away from home

Thanks to a pair of re-scheduled Justin Timberlake shows, the Raiders have been set up in Edmonton since their game on Monday night.

Originally, the Raiders and Oil Kings were to meet Wednesday night before carrying on to Calgary on Friday and Lethbridge on Saturday, but Timberlake’s shows pushed the WHL match to Monday, setting up a three-day layover in oil country.

During the stay, the Raiders had the opportunity to share a practice rink with the Oilers on Wednesday as the NHL club took the ice before the Raiders.

Afterwards, the team was invited inside the impressive locker room that the Oilers call home at Rogers Place.

Clinched

Thanks to Raiders’ Manager of Communications and Community Relations Brett Smith for digging up some statistics pertaining to early playoff berths.

With a spot in the big dance secured on Feb. 5, the Raiders clinched playoffs earlier than anybody WHL team has in the last five seasons. The Portland Winterhawks earned a ticket on Jan. 30, 2013, and the Kelowna Rockets clinched just three days later. Nobody since than has done it earlier in the year.

The next clinching scenario in line for the Raiders is the East Division and Eastern Conference title, with Saskatoon sitting in second place in both scenarios.

By my math (questionable at best), the magic number of points gained by the Raiders and lost by the Blades to secure first place is 14 points. Leaguewide, that magic number between the Raiders and Everett Silvertips is 22 points.

The Captains

This week, we wrapped up our four-part series on the captains of the Prince Albert Raiders on paNOW. A big thank you to the players, their families, and the coaching staff for cooperating on this.

It was a lot of fun to put together.

If you missed it, you can still read the features on Parker Kelly, Brayden Pachal, Montgomery, and Zack Hayes.

Plus/Minus

Pachal continues to lead the way in plus/minus this season, with an incredible plus-62 rating in just 50 games played.

The all-time WHL record was set by Len Barrie with the Kamloops Blazers back in 1989-90 at plus-87. At the current rate, if Pachal plays every game the rest of the way, he’s on pace for plus-82 in 66 games.

In the modern era of the WHL, with online statistics going back to 1996, Andrew Ference has the high-mark at plus-75 in 1998-98 with the Portland Winterhawks. The Raiders’ franchise record isn’t available, as I would assume that it was likely set sometime during the Terry Simpson era. Since 1996, the highest mark set by a Raider was Marc Brown’s +37 in the 1998-99 season.

It may be a tall order to catch the mark set by Barrie, but no matter what, Brayden Pachal is on pace for a historic season. In 50 games this season, Pachal has had a minus rating only once, that being on Nov. 27 in Red Deer.

Not far behind him is his defence partner Zack Hayes, who is on pace for somewhere around plus-73.

Considering those two take on the toughest defensive assignments for this team night in and night out, it’s all the more impressive what they’ve been able to do.

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trevor.redden@jpbg.ca

On Twitter: @Trevor_Redden