Conference leaders play in Kamloops tonight

And so the Kamloops Blazers are 40-12-1-3 record, good for the lead in the WHL. I had joked earlier this month that this is like the 1994-95 season all over again, the Cougars are last and the Blazers are first (even attendance is close, as the Cougars played the 1994-95 season out of the Coliseum and could only get a maximum of 2,000 fans a game). While the Cougars were fairly competitive from 1997 to 2002, they've been mediocre since (2007 playoff run excluded). The Blazers were also consistently below average for better than a decade. Yet they appear to finally be turning the corner and turning into a success story again (still too easy to get ahead, and playoffs will tell the real story).
Kamloops meets the Edmonton Oil Kings tonight in a battle of the two conference leaders. Yes, Kamloops and Edmonton! Who would've predicted that at the beginning of the season?
The Cougars are back to rebuilding for the millionth time with talks about a positive future, while another two franchises have showed the ability to improve substantially in only one year. Last year, Kamloops missed the playoffs and Edmonton was knocked off in the first round as a seventh seed.
Also is it really that good for a franchise to have this many young players in the lineup? I know they can learn from losing, but can't it also hurt your development to be getting shown up on home ice? Having also watched my share of Cougars games, some of the youngsters are already showing signs of apathy on the ice. Either that or the opposition is playing so well I'm not noticing them. At least they have Owsley in net, he's the biggest reason they're in the playoff hunt.
It wasn't really all that long ago that Portland was a laughing stock as well. Oh, how ownership and management changes and change things. In P.G., it's still the status quo. I know I'm beating a dead horse here, it's nothing new. But it doesn't make it any less frustrating when you look around the league and see other teams turning things around. Again, maybe I'm getting a bit ahead of myself.