Brown Bears’ turnaround season fuels fire for more

What a difference a year made for the Kenai River Brown Bears.

In the 2021-22 season, the team finished with the second worst record in the North American Hockey League at 14-41-3-2.

Despite that, the Brown Bears organization and Nate Kiel, general manager, elevated Taylor Shaw from interim to head coach on April 28, 2022. In doing so, the Bears were betting on the core of the team that just finished 14-41-3-2.

With Shaw leading 10 of those same players, the Bears had one of the best of the franchise’s 16 seasons in 2022-23.

Kenai River finished 32-24-3-1 to set the franchise record for wins. In the process, goalie Nils Wallstrom set the franchise mark for most wins in a season at 26.

The Bears also finished third in the Midwest Division to earn the franchise’s eighth playoff berth.

The biggest mark against the Bears came when they could not earn the franchise’s second playoff series win, getting swept by the Minnesota Wilderness in a series that ended Friday.

Shaw said he met with the players the next day.

“The message was to hopefully fuel the fire,” he said. “We have a taste of what we want to do for next season.

“We’ll give them a couple weeks off, then the work begins.”

By Sunday, Shaw said he was already bored because of the hole left not by going to the rink and coaching all the time. That hasn’t kept him from looking back at the massive turnaround this season.

“That is something they’re going to take with them for the rest of their life,” Shaw said of his players. “Maybe some of it won’t sink in — the life lessons and everything we talk about daily at the rink.

“It might not sink in until they are 40 years old, but hopefully they’ll take a few pieces with them.”

Kenai River was the only Alaska team to make the playoffs. The Bears had to finish better than the Anchorage Wolverines, the Robertson Cup runner-up in their inaugural season of 2021-22, and longtime rivals Fairbanks Ice Dogs.

The Ice Dogs missed the playoffs for the first time in the franchise’s 26-year history. Kenai River finished 6-4-0-2 against Fairbanks, only the second time the Bears had a winning record against the Ice Dogs. Kenai River also had the second sweep in Fairbanks in franchise history.

“I think that that’s just a big change in the culture, to be honest with you,” Shaw said. “It certainly wasn’t easy at times, but our group was extremely resilient throughout the year. This group will never be together on the ice again, but they certainly left their stamp on the history of the organization.”

Shaw said that resiliency extended to the playoffs, but the Bears were not rewarded. The coach said his team may have played its best game of the season in the 2-1 overtime loss Friday to the Wilderness that closed the series. The event was the first home playoff game for the Bears since 2014.

When the coaching staff got the stats Saturday morning, those stats showed the Bears had been superior in all the major categories except goals.

“I give them a ton of props,” Shaw said of his team. “They stayed with it, they were well prepared, they executed what we needed them to do.

“That’s just the game of hockey. Sometimes it’s a goal the other way.”

The Bears will have nine players on their roster age out. Shaw said none have committed to college yet, but all have opportunities and those announcements should be coming shortly.

Kenai River also will lose Wallstrom, who has another year of junior eligibility, to Division I American International College.

Besides those 10 players, everybody else can return.

Shaw said the staff may look different next season, but Shaw said he plans on returning as head coach and looks forward to building on everything he learned in his first year as an official NAHL head coach.

“The game evolves every single year, and if you don’t continue to evolve with it, you find yourself out,” Shaw said. “What we did throughout the year constantly changed.

“I think that helped us to find different ways to win and have success.”

Garett Drotts, Kenai River’s leading scorer, is committed to Division I Augustana University. Drotts has another year of junior eligibility and Shaw said Augustana is not sure if it will take Drotts for 2023-24.

Kenai River’s other two Division I committed players will not be taken by their schools next season, according to Shaw.

Bryce Monrean, Kenai River’s third leading scorer, has a year of eligibility left and is committed to the University of Alaska Fairbanks.

Bryant Marks, who started the season near the top of some of the league goalie statistics before an injury kept him out for much of the second half of the season, had two years of eligibility left. Marks is committed to the University of Alaska Anchorage.

Any of the potential returners also could move up a tier to the United States Hockey League.

“We couldn’t be more happy for those guys to get opportunities,” Shaw said. “To be able to be a part of that is great for us and great for them.”

Add it all up and 16 players with significant experience could return to the Bears.

“The biggest thing for them, in our conversations at the rink and outside of it, is just because it happened this year doesn’t mean it’s going to happen next season,” Shaw said. “We’re going to have to work that much harder to make it happen again.”

Shaw said the Bears also will be more attractive to incoming players after this season.

“When you do things the right way, you build the right way and you go about your business the right way, and you have employees and the community and all the support, then you put that with a winning program and it can be a destination,” he said. “That’s always been our goal to get there, and it’s not all the way there yet.”

In addition to laying a foundation on the ice, Shaw also said the Bears have done great in the community this season. He said players got into schools almost every week they were home.

“We’ve had a ton of people come up and say they’ve never seen crowds like this, not just for the playoff game, but for the months leading up to it,” Shaw said. “We can’t thank the community enough for being able and willing to support these guys and come out and support them.”