 |
| Lorne Molleken mans the Blades bench on March 1, 2013. (Steve Hiscock/Saskatoon Blades) |
Having spent 14 seasons with the WHL club over two different stints in the roles of head coach and general manager, Molleken authentically cared about the hockey team, his players and Saskatoon as a city. The emotion could be seen during his farewell press conference in late March of 2014 when he mutually parted ways with the team that just finished its first season under the ownership of the Priestner family.
The always classy Molleken said at that farewell presser the time had come to shake hands and move on and that there were no hard feelings. He was doing his part in clearing the way for the new owners to properly put their stamp on the team.
On Friday, the Blades will honour their all-time leader in head coaching victories as the 65-year-old Molleken will have a builder’s banner raised to the rafter of the SaskTel Centre before the club’s regular season finale against the Brandon Wheat Kings set for 7 p.m. The game should be a good one too as the Blades sit fifth overall in the WHL’s Eastern Conference with a 37-26-3-1 record with the Wheat Kings sitting sixth overall in the conference with a 35-26-3-2 mark.
Molleken will forever be linked with some of the Blades best days under the ownership of the Brodsky family working alongside Rick and then Jack. Jack Brodsky would quickly become a lifetime best friend.
During his first stint with the Blades from 1991 to 1995, Molleken served as the Blades head coach as another one of his lifetime best friends in Daryl Lubiniecki toiled in the role of general manager.
That group of men took the Blades to the WHL Championship Series on two occasions in 1992 and 1994. In both appearances, the Blades fell in a series deciding Game 7 to the dynasty Kamloops Blazers.
The Blazers of that era are still viewed as having hit the ice with some of the best teams ever seen in the history of major junior hockey winning the WHL championship and Memorial Cup as CHL champions in 1992, 1994 and 1995.
Had the Blades been able to best the Blazers in one of those Game 7 encounters in the WHL Final in 1992 or 1994, there could well have been a Memorial Cup championship parade through downtown Saskatoon.
The deep playoff runs and success the Blades were having saw Molleken depart to the professional ranks following the 1994-95 campaign. He ultimately served as head coach of the NHL’s Chicago Blackhawks for the last part of the 1998-99 season and the first part of the 1999-2000 campaign.
The Regina product returned to the WHL to serve as head coach of his hometown Pats when they hosted the Memorial Cup in the 2000-01 campaign. He departed to the professional ranks again after that season, but came back to the WHL part way through the 2002-03 campaign as general manager of the Moose Jaw Warriors.
 |
| Lorne Molleken gives instructions on the Blades bench in Oct. 2012 |
Molleken served as head coach and general manager through to the end of the 2012-13 season after the Blades hosted the Memorial Cup. The Blades were sold from the Brodsky to the Priestner family during the 2013 off-season, and Molleken stayed on for one more campaign just as the general manager with Dave Struch handling the duties of head coach.
Struch was one of Molleken’s former star overage players from the 1991-92 campaign.
During Molleken’s second stint, the Blades topped the WHL’s East Division three times. They finished first overall in the WHL in 2010-11 posting the franchise’s best ever record at 56-13-1-2.
The regular season success didn’t translate into post-season success as Molleken’s second stint was littered with first and second round playoff exits.
Molleken’s combined 14 seasons with the Blades ultimate shows that life can be unfair. He put in a true and honest effort to build a team in Saskatoon that went all the way.
The Blades had teams that were good enough to go all the way in Molleken’s days. With that said, it is hard to win in the WHL, and there are lots of times in the sports world where ultimate victory just doesn’t get achieved.
The Blades with Molleken came incredibly close with those Game 7 WHL Championship Series losses in 1992 and 1994. The frustration was compounded when the Blades weren’t able to return to the WHL Final during Molleken’s second stint with the team.
There were times over the last four seasons Molleken spent with the Blades where fan criticism got extremely loud and sometimes was unfair.
Molleken might have been the most disappointed the ultimate victory never came with the Blades. He would always say he understood the fan disappointment and that not winning the WHL title and a Memorial Cup felt like those missing things.
Molleken had a 539-325-58 regular season record with 23 ties over his career as the Blades head coach. He deserved to enjoy one WHL title and one Memorial Cup win with the Brodsky family along with Lubiniecki.
While navigating all the ups and downs, Molleken always gave solid and accurate post-game interviews win or lose every game that often recognized the fact two teams were out there trying to win a hockey game. He often credited the opponents for what they were able to do to get wins or how well the opponents played when the Blades won.
 |
| Lorne Molleken makes a plea from the Blades bench in Oct. 2012. |
Molleken was a players’ coach and the players were his boys. You could see that in the excitement he had when he delivered the starting lineups before games.
If you allow him, Molleken can tell numerous stories of the great memories he has of the quality players and people he coached.
The list of players he worked with included the likes of Norm Maracle, Ryan Fujita, Rhett Warrener, Struch, the late Wade Belak, Frank Banham and Andy MacIntyre in his first stint to Devin Setoguchi, Derek Hulak, Braden Holtby, Connor Cox, Darren Dietz and Nelson Nogier in his second stint. That list of names could obviously be much more lengthy.
Molleken always had his players’ backs and would go to old school lengths to ensure they were protected, if the opposition took liberties on them.
That was best shown when Red Deer Rebels right-winger Josh Cowen ran Blades netminder Steven Stanford inside the final minute of Game 2 of a first round playoff series on March 21, 2010 at the SaskTel Centre. When that incident occurred, the contest was already decided as the Blades were up by the 4-0 final score.
On the ensuing faceoff after Stanford got hit, Molleken sent out his five toughest players who went after the Rebels skaters on the ice starting a line brawl right after puck drop. Molleken was ensuring a message was sent that any cheap shots like the one Stanford took weren’t going to be tolerated.
During the brawl, Molleken was getting in a verbal confrontation with the Red Deer coaches. Of course, suspensions galore resulted from the extracurriculars.
Molleken always carried a line of tough guys to protect the team due to the fact he was worried that there were still too many pure old school coaches in the WHL even near the end of his time with the Blades.
If the opponent played straight up, Molleken ensured his team played straight up. While Blades followers often like to talk about the sexy stories like the brawl against the Rebels, the Blades under Molleken usually had quite a bit of skill on their first three lines and could play some fantastic wide open offensive hockey.
After leaving the Blades, Molleken, who sits fourth on the WHL’s career regular season head coaching wins list with 626 victories, worked one more season in the WHL as the head coach of the Vancouver Giants in 2015-16 before leaving the major junior ranks all together. He is still involved in the game serving as the director of coach development of the Prairie Hockey Academy.
While he no longer works for the Blades, Molleken has popped back into the SaskTel Centre every now and then to see the Blades play. When he pops in, Molleken will often be sitting with Jack Brodsky and Lubiniecki sharing stories about the good old days.
Molleken will be viewed as the greatest coach the Blades ever had until a bench boss comes along and oversees the Blades winning their first WHL title and Memorial Cup. Whenever that happens, you can bet Molleken would be the first person that wants to shake that coach’s hand.
 |
| Lorne Molleken, right, with Jack Brodsky on March 5, 2013. |
If you have any comments you would like to pass along about this post, feel free to email them to stankssports@gmail.com. All photos in this post are courtesy Steve Hiscock/Saskatoon Blades. Stanks’ Sermon passes on a huge thanks to Hiscock for the photos of Molleken.
-------
If you like what you
see here, you might want to donate to the cause to keep independent media like
this blog going. Should you choose to help out, feel free to click on the
DONATE button in the upper right corner. Thank you for
stopping in.
