Inaugural Season Behind, Hitmen Look To Future

Austin Cihak appeared in all 56 regular season games up to last Saturday for the Chicago Hitmen. (Shawn Clisham/The Journal)

.Posted: Wednesday, March 23, 2011 6:00 pm

Inaugural Season Behind, Hitmen Look To Future By STEPHEN GORDON Special to the Journal Journal & Topics Newspapers | 0 comments

Going into their inaugural season in the North American Hockey League (NAHL), the Chicago Hitmen were not really sure what to expect in terms of the competition they would face each time they would take the ice.

Saturday's loss to the Michigan Warriors 6-0 by the Hitmen was a microcosm of what this first season has been like for the team based out of West Meadows Ice Arena.

"We have a lot of young guys who want to play in this league but they lack experience," first-year coach Steve Pronger said. "Talent is a result of experience and that is something this team and its players coming into this year did not have."

Through 56 games this season, the Hitmen are 9-43-4 and have made a total of 53 player transactions. They sit in 7th place in the North Division of the NAHL and through all of what the team has been through, only one player, fwd. Austin Cihak, was able to play in all 56 games for the Hitmen this season.

"Perhaps the best thing for us will be the future and have something to look back on which will show us what we need to do to be successful as an organization," Pronger said. "I look forward to a lot of the kids we have on this roster growing up and maturing over the summer."

The Hitmen Saturday night in their final regular season home game gave up two first period goals, a goal in the middle period and three third-period goals en route to the 6-0 pasting.

"There were tons of lessons to be learned this season by us," Pronger said. "This was a foundation year for us. The thing we lacked the most this year was a last year. This is a start-up business if anything. We did a lot of good things this year and perhaps the best thing is that we have this product in the Chicago market. We want to be here and the league wants us to be here as we are the largest market city on the NAHL."

The Hitmen are expected to have anywhere from 10 to 13 draft picks to use in the May 25 NAHL Entry Draft. The team will hold a pre-draft camp 10 days prior to the draft to look at what players could be a fit for the team.

"We already have looked at a fair amount of high school hockey players in this area," Pronger said, "and a number of those kids are on our draft list. We want this team to have a Chicago flavor on this team."

For Roselle native Cihak, the season has been one filled with challenges.

"The beginning of the season, my expectations were very high," Cihak said. "I have no complaints though about this season. It has been a fun year for me. I feel a sense of accomplishment and if anything this season has taught me that when the going gets tough, to just keep my head down as work as hard as I can."

The Hitmen conclude the regular season next weekend with two games in St. Louis.

Talent is no way a result of experience. Talent is talent, some is raw, some has experience. John Wooden said "I'd rather have a lot of talent and a little experience than a lot of experience and a little talent.”

So they plan to use NAHL draft picks on Illinois high school players? Alright then...

This coach is either being politically correct or clueless. They picked a bunch of players who didn't belong in the NAHL and didn't know that. Now they're looking at HS players? I think its the coach and owners who lack the critical experience here. It starts at the top. The top assembled a team that had no chance and they didn't know how wrong they were.Unfortunately, the Chicago kids with talent wouldn't touch this team with a 10 foot pole.

NA3HL team to Nattys. Great job boy's