THE VIEW DOWN 897

The voice of the Lloydminster Bobcats John Spigott will offer his unique perspective on the league every Wednesday on TheRobbHunter.com

First and foremost, a big thanks to Mr. Hunter for allowing the enemy to infiltrate his blog on Wednesdays.

The Bobcats head to St. Albert tonight for a big road game against the struggling Steel. St. Albert has only won once in their last six meetings, while the Bobcats are coming off a big 6-4 win over Drumheller (more on that in a bit). But I don’t quite understand what’s going on in St. Albert. GM/head coach Greg Parks has a team that can really fill the net (and look out next year, all his big guns are 19 or younger) but can’t keep it out, and yet, Parks is stockpiling forwards. Brady Hogg and David Andreassen are the most notable ones to come into St. Albert lately. But who plays defence on this team? I guess the acquisition of Colby Sutton from Drayton should help. But 108 goals against in 26 games is obscene. And what gives in net? I thought MacInnis and Kotylak would be one of the better tandems in the North this year, but that hasn’t been the case.

Great game for the Bobcats on Saturday against the Dragons. Five separate players dropped the gloves, including a real heavyweight square-off between Dragons tough guy Trent Colberg (for my money the toughest in the league) and Bobcats blueliner Taylor Swaffield. Swaffield missed the first two and a half months of the season recovering from summer surgery, and promptly dropped the mitts twice last weekend. Swaffield took it to Jeff Houghton of the Crusaders on Friday before agreeing to tangle with Colberg, and it was a good one. Decision went to Colberg, but a good showing by Swaffield, who in my mind is very close to becoming one of the league’s heavyweights, alongside Colberg, Justin Lutz in Brooks, Bradley Drobot in Calgary, and possibly Bonnyville’s Ashton Hewson, who merits consideration after the reported thrashing I heard he laid on Drobot. Those are the first four off the top of my head, maybe a few more.

Best fight of the night – at least for the Bobcats – was rookie Riley Gillies and Drum’s Colin Bergman. Those two centremen squared off right after a face-off, and Gillies – who boxes in the offseason and demolished Brad Ryan of the Calgary Canucks at Kootenay’s main camp – mopped the floor with Bergman, who was clearly in over his head. Grabbed the jersey with the left and proceeded to drill Bergman three times with that same left hand, gave Bergman a head fake and KO’d him with three solid rights. Gillies – listed at 5’10”, 180, is going to absolutely ruin some middleweights in this league in his career.

A quick note on the power rankings. I was in some disagreement with Robb (and I guess I won out!) about the placing of Brooks. I had five North Division teams ahead of anyone from South, for one simple reason: as it stands right now, I just can’t see anyone from the South beating Sherwood Park, Spruce Grove, Bonnyville, GP, or Fort Mac in a 7 game series. Simple as that.

See you next Wednesday.