April 25, 2023 • 47 mins
Adrian Denny, Brett Fera and Kim Cota-Robles rejoin one last time to wrap up the season with Head Coach Steve Potvin. They recap the Roadrunners Playoff series, progress and development made during the regular season, Mike Carcone and the coaching staff.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:02):
Tucson Roadrunners Happy Hours open for pennythingbut business. Joined Adrian Denny, Bret
Vera, and kimda Roblas. It'san hour of hockey and high junes.
Kim sometimes jokes just write themselves.We'll have special guests every week and excited
now to bring on a special guestyour friend in mind, everybody, It's
(00:23):
always a good time on Roadrunners HappyHours. Good afternoon, everybody. Welcome
to the season finale of Roadrunners.Happy Hour here on Fox Sports fourteen fifty
am is straight up five o'clock onyour Tuesday afternoon with Brett Vera and Kim
Coda Roblas. I'm Adrian Denny,Roadwinners head coach Steve Popman will be our
special guests joining us coming up injust a few minutes here on our usual
(00:47):
Tuesday night get together Kim and Brett. Great to be back with you guys.
I was thinking about it. Canwe get through this without any tears?
I mean, it's it's not aseries finale, it's a season final,
Alley, We're going to all beback. But what are you gonna
do next Tuesday afternoon and the evening? Like, what are we gonna do?
(01:07):
What do people do on Tuesdays atfive when they're listen to us?
Do we go and listen to usin the car? Like? Is it
this wartex that you know the spacetime continuum freezes on us? What we've
got the podcast? We could gettogether and listen to us on the podcast
We've got We've I think we've gotI think this is like the twenty fifth
(01:30):
or twenty sixth addition a happy Hour. I couldn't believe we were pushing.
Yeah, we're we're pushing thirty.Uh so you've got you've got plenty to
go back and listen to. We'vebeen with you every week with a special
guest talking Roadrunners Hockey, and we'lltalk about it with head coach Steve Popman
coming up when he joins us.But guys, it's it's something when you
(01:56):
enter a day where you're winning anadvanced and moving on and planning to go
to Calgary and we're driving over theten on our way to the arena and
you're you're looking at it and you'relike, well, if this going a
bird hits the windshield, Okay,I mean this is this is my I'm
(02:23):
the journalist putting my hat on moment, the last one of the year.
But no, it's it's got tobe tough though, to to also feel
how great those two days must havefelt. And then you know it's a
tough start. But at the sametime, you're I can only imagine what
you're saying, Adrian, that you'reright. That like waking up that morning
on Sunday, that's that is,that is what sports is all about.
(02:43):
Yeah, And in a in ain a deciding game, right on,
one team was going to move on, one team was going to to move
on themselves. And so we're drivingdriving over the ten on our way to
the Actressure Arena on Sunday afternoon,and and we know, if we win,
we are going to take a right. Uh no, we're gonna take
(03:07):
a left and we're gonna go toLos Angeles and we're gonna fly to Calgary
on Monday. If we lose,we're gonna come back. We're gonna go
that way and we're gonna go backhome, which is usually where you want
to go, but but not inthis case. Yeah, Kim, I
screwed up all the all the directionsthere because you're you're coming from the opposite
way on the never Nevertheless, oneway was gonna go to Tucson, one
(03:30):
way it was gonna go to LosAngeles, and we ended up coming back
to Tucson. But that's how itwent. Roadrunners winning that game on on
Friday night, forcing the the gamethree in the playoff series. And and
and I'm thinking, we're in agood spot here because won the last game.
(03:51):
We're we've got forty eight hours tocome into the next one. I
felt that we had the better coachingstaff. I felt that we had a
team that had been test stood throughadversity, that had shown the ability to
beat good teams. And I feltthat we had a good team going up
against a team that had a goodyear with really good players, that was
(04:12):
a really good team that had notgone through adversity. So that that's why
I would have given the Roadrunners theedge going into that game. And in
the end, it was the teamwith the second best record in the league
that went into the final week ofthe regular season with a chance to have
the best record in the league onceagain with their experienced group, with their
(04:34):
veteran group again the Seattle Crack,and an organization that that's not really your
typical AHL team because much like Hendersona couple of years ago when they joined
the league under expansion Vegas, theyhave had time to draft develop. It's
not really a minor league team ofprospects. It's a minor league team of
(04:55):
guys you're going to call up ifthere's injury situations in Seattle. So that's
what we were kind of going upagainst a young organization and the Roadrunners and
the Coyotes with a really good coachingstaff that's been able to develop players and
get this team to overachieve and beatteams that were above them in the standings
and in first place. And inthe end it was Coachella Valley, the
(05:18):
experienced team able to capitalize on experience, turned some key moments into momentum situations.
They did at Wednesday, they wentup three nothing in the first nine
minutes, Roadrunners controlled rest of thegame. Friday, it was all Tucson
Sunday again, back to the momentumand a young team that wasn't quite able
to reel it in get the trainback on the tracks, and unfortunately that
(05:44):
was it in both games the Roadrunnerslost. It came down to the first
ten minutes. By the game Breadyou just paid a heck of a compliment
to Steve Poppin without even realizing it. You know, you talked about the
Roadrunners, in your opinion, havinga better coaching staff, more situationally prepared
coaching staff for that circumstance. AndI'm not disagreeing with that whatsoever. But
we got to remember the coach onthe other side of that bench is a
(06:05):
Stanley Cup winning coach who a formerPhoenix Roadrunner Dan a couple of seasons in
Phoenix as a Roadrunner. But thebut yeah, that that's you're you're not
wrong on that that you know they'rethey were built to do this Cachella Valley
was, and so to have anupstart team. You know, you and
I talked about this. Um,I hope it's okay, And I'm not
(06:26):
blowing the can open on something wetalked about when we're not on the record
or on the air, But youand I talked about this and kind of
the the frustration, not frustration withyou, but like the frustration over the
idea that, like, are peoplegoing to hang on the fact that the
Roadrunners are the only team making theplayoffs that are under five hundred And I
look at the positive side of that, I guess that you win that game
(06:47):
on Sunday, and it's not afluke. You're proving that, you know,
who cares what that record was.They played a gauntlet of a schedule
against a lot of good teams.There's a reason seven of the ten and
all six major HL awards came fromthe Pacific Division. And we could have
argued that even if Mike Carcony beatDustin Wolf for the MVP, it's still
a Pacific Division awards. So Ithink all of that played a factor in
(07:09):
the Roadrunners being ready and tested.I said this, you know, in
my final story for The Star onSunday about the season, that this team
had been playing playoff hockey for threemonths and very few teams can claim that.
Maybe Bakersfield and maybe San Jose becausethat's who was above them and who
was below them for almost all ofthose three months. But other than that,
(07:30):
everyone else was kind of going throughthe motions of their season and playing
well but not getting tested like that. And so to see what the road
Runners were able to do in Gametwo on Friday, it didn't start well
and that's the problem, but theyplayed two and a half good periods on
Sunday. It just came after arough ten minutes. And here's why I
say I give the edge to theRoadrunners coaching staff over a Stanley Cup winner
(07:50):
in Dan Bilesma, who's had agreat career. He's a good coach,
he did a great job with thatgroup of veterans. But the road Runners
coaches Steve Potman, John Slaney,Zach Startini, they've been adjusting on the
fly every week in Stephen John's case, for the last six years. Albeit
(08:11):
seventeen eighteen that team was was assembledtogether for most of the year eighteen nineteen
again kinda nineteen twenty kind of yeah, it was twenty one, twenty two,
twenty two, twenty three. Asas the Coyotes have started, their
process has been constant readjustment. Andwe've seen the Roadrunners with the constant readjustment
(08:39):
consistently been able to compete, comeout, adjust game plans, adjust lineups,
still have success. Has it beenthe success that Coachella Valley had Calgary
had, no? But but relativelyspeaking, that's uh, that's a lot,
uh, a lot of moving piecesfor for some really smart guys that
(09:05):
they've been able to keep going andand and and you look at so the
XS and o's aspect. We're goingto talk to Steve coming up in just
a few minutes. There's the personalaspect, the motivational aspect, and and
you'll hear it, folks when whenwe talk to Steve and if this guy's
giving you a game plan and alsodeveloping you individually for the nhl' you're gonna
(09:31):
see why we we can say withoutgiving any any kind of you know,
comparison to Dan Bilesma, while we'lltake why we take our group in any
day of the week and why it'sso exciting as you look at the progress
we made, you know, thelast two years. We last season winning
(09:54):
percentage improved from the season before,this season, seven more wins in the
year before, and you kind oflook at this kind of year number three
of this generation of Roadrunners and improvetheir wins, qualified for the playoffs,
and I think it's a team thatachieved success. Doesn't doesn't take away one
(10:15):
thing, Kim, how you meand Charlie felt Me, Kim and Roadrunners
goaltender development coach Charlie McTavish, we'reall together, um, Friday night and
Sunday night. It was great tohave Kim in town and joining me and
Charlie. But we went through thehighs on Friday, we went through the
lows on Sunday, and Kim,it didn't take away any of the pain,
(10:35):
any of the heartbreak that we werein a deciding game three with a
chance to move on. Even thoughyou look at the first seventy two games
the regular season, the first twoplayoff games, that's a that's a huge
success. And I'll tell you this, Kim, I am just as glad
that you were there with us onSunday as I was to have you with
us for the victory on Friday.I was so excited to be there.
(10:58):
Very it was hard, it washeartbreaking, it was Yeah, I don't
even know how to describe it.But when you talk about the progress that
this team has made, they trulyare a development team. And you see
this in the growth of the players. The players who have been with us,
you know for a few years,like Um, you know, like
Yan, Yeah, like Key Big, you know, you you see them
(11:20):
get better and better and better,and you're just waiting for them to get
to that that next level. Andthen all we have all these call ups
this year, I'm sure next yearis going to be, you know,
just as frantic and insane with themneeding the talent that we have here.
And one of the things that Iwanted to talk about too was I obviously
had not been to an away gamethis season. In fact, ever,
(11:43):
I don't think so. This wasmy first experience and an accressher is really
loud. I don't know if youguys can can get it how loud it
is over HLTV, but I'm losingmy voice a little bit, and I
honestly think it's just from trying totalk to you, Adrian, and early
during the game, just trying toyell so that you could hear me because
it was so Their PA system isincredibly loud, the music cloud, the
(12:07):
fans are constantly doing something so andI want to ask Steve about it in
a little bit, like how muchof an effect that has on the team,
especially when we're behind so quickly ina game like that like that was
very, very difficult scene the entirething, Kim, I wanted to ask
you about Friday Night's game in particularly, I know I agree with what Adrian
(12:28):
said that you know, I wasn'tthere, but I think that's a very
sweet thing to say about having youknow you there for Sunday compared to Friday,
because it was the experiences are different, but there it's a totality of
the season and you are such animportant part, not just on this show,
but obviously you're roll during home gamesthat you know, you see this
(12:50):
team literally closer than any of usdo. And I wanted to ask you,
you know, I'm watching it onHLTV on Friday. I could not
get a hotel in Cachella Valley duringunderstand I heard, I heard it took
you a little bit of a trekto get to get up. I tend
to get to the game because itjust I think you said you were going
to LA and probably you know savedsaved significant dollars doing so. Um,
(13:15):
But watching that game Friday that youknow, I know, I know Cochella
Valley crawled back in it. Butthe Roadrunners looked so good out of the
gates on Friday, like I was. I was more impressed with that first
thirty five forty minutes than just aboutany game I've seen all year, considering
the circumstances do or die, consideringplaying in an arena like that in front
(13:37):
of a crowd like that and againstthe team that's you know all year in
one or two in the league.I want to know if you saw that
too from from in person, becauseagain EBVW is a little different, but
it was eye opening to me towatch how fast Tucson came out in that
game. Yeah, that was.It was fantastic and it was so energizing,
(13:58):
and it was Adrian, I'm sureused to this, but I'm not.
I'm not used to being like theonly one in the stands of like
me and one other guy who's cheeringfor the Roadrunners, um in it was.
Yeah, it was absolutely it wasgreat to see that team on Friday
night. That was a lot offun, Absolutely fantastic. Joining us now
our special guest, the head coachof the Tucson road Runners, Steve Popman.
(14:20):
Steve, Welcome to Happy Hour.Great to have you as always,
good to see you all. Goodto see you all. I wish we're
under different circumstances, but nevertheless,it's good to see you well. Steve.
It's it's it's it's heartbreaking right tolose in the playoffs. It's uh,
it's you go into it, yougo all in and then I don't
(14:43):
know, have you gotten to thepart yet of the process where you're able
to look back at the seventy twogame regular season from a team standpoint,
from a development standpoint, from ahockey development standpoint, and Tucson and say,
boy, that was a heck ofa year. And we're proud of
because because we're proud of you.But at the same time, we know
what it's like to have to havethe season end just like that and have
(15:05):
your heart broken with a with agroup that that you love. We we
did have a chance to to lookin a little bit. Obviously, we
had our end of the season meetingsand those are always difficult after losing in
the first round. It's like yousaid, we did do some really good
things. It was a difficult year. There were some barriers we had to
overcome. We saw a lot ofplayers go up and down throughout the season.
(15:31):
There was definitely some some development anduh, you know that's that's going
to be ongoing. But you knowwhat we're we're not satisfied with the with
the end result is. You know, I'm sure everybody on this panel feels
the same. You know, weum we definitely showed that we can play
and compete against anyone, and it'sjust about being consistent and and doing it
(15:54):
over a longer period and definitely overa longer stretch during the play us,
Steve, we started the show todaybefore you joined us with Adrian kind of
talking about what it was like wakingup Sunday and having the knowledge of,
like, what was the potential today? And I recognize it didn't end how
(16:14):
you guys wanted or planned, butbut what was that like for you?
Especially considering where this organization has beenthe last few years, considering that the
best possible chance to win a playoffseries since twenty eighteen, the season gets
cut short and then you know,it's been a battle to get back to
this point, and I just wantedto know after the success you guys saw
Friday, was what was Sunday morningand kind of getting getting to game time
(16:37):
like for you, you know,there's probably some anxiety, but also there's
got to be a lot of excitementto know what you guys are capable of
doing. And you know, youguys lost the game, but we all
know that that could have gone anyother different direction. If a puck bounce
is a different way to start itoff. So I'd love to hear from
you how how that day started foryou. Yeah, there's definitely some excitement.
(16:59):
Honestly, that I was one ofthe nights. I slept the best
the night before. Ironically, usuallythere's not a lot of sleep the night
before, but I think to thatpoint there's been so much adrenaline and you
know, if you're you're up atnight trying to get that next win.
And it was ironic that we wereable to sleep a little bit better the
night before the game. But itwas a three o'clock start, so waking
(17:22):
up, we had a lot ofenergy. We were ready to go,
and to be honest with you,the rhythm felt a little bit off,
you know, being at three o'clockgame. We had to several buses for
different times for breakfast, and there'sa little bit of a distraction. But
nevertheless, we were we were excited, and we were prepared and uh,
(17:44):
you know, and unfortunately we gotoff to a shaky startup. But I
think it had a lot to dowith how badly we wanted it. You
know, in our coverage, wewent in double and it you know,
it freed up a man in theslot and they were able to get it
to him, and you know,it just showed how I guess how on
our toes we were. We youknow, we just over extended ourselves a
(18:06):
little bit and like I said,it freed up a man in the slot
and end up in the back ofthe net and then you know what to
try to get back after you know, four straight goals. It was.
It was difficult. Our guys didn'tquit. We didn't you know, obviously
we didn't give up a goal atthat point. But I'm proud of our
guys. They they they accomplished alot this year. They had to go
(18:27):
through, like I said earlier,some barriers and you know what, we
got to our goal. We justfell a little bit short. So Steve
um I don't know why this yearis so much more difficult for me than
previous years, but maybe the guysjust seem like so much more of a
(18:48):
cocisive unit, so much more.You seem to be having so much more
fun together, um So, andyou can see it. You could see
how hard they were working in everygame to make it happen. So I'm
curious. One of the things thatwe've talked about with a few of the
players is how emotionally intelligent you arehow you're a players coach, And I
(19:10):
was curious. I asked Adam lastweek about the psychology of players coming up
and down and having to constantly readjustfor that. How did you manage that
on a coaching level? What wasthat like, you know, with losing
players and then having guys in andout and having to readjust lines, you
know, pretty consistently for months andmonths. Yeah, that's it's it's difficult,
(19:34):
especially when you know at the endof the season when we got players
back from the NHL that we're upfor some time. I think that was
the toughest because you know, it'sit's like you said, there's those relationships
and you know, we had there'sa bond being formed with the guys that
were there that had to really pushand when you have to push together and
(19:57):
you have success together there, youknow, it's you do create that bond.
And there's a lot of people anda lot of players with character in
our locker room, and so youknow, those relationships are tied real tight
when you have that type of characterin the locker room, and you know
what, to Brett's point, ithad been a long time since we had
(20:19):
been there and the guys were fightingreally hard to bring our our our team
back there and to record and werecognize that we wanted to build the culture
here and so it gave us anopportunity to do that, and the guys
just seemed real excited to go throughwith it and really try to build something.
(20:41):
And that's now we have to lookat last season as as the start
of something, and so we haveto, you know, continue on forward
and look for ways to improve.And you know, there's a lot of
areas last season personally as a coach, as a coaching staff will make improvements.
(21:02):
And then you know there's some playersin the locker room that also would
you know, if they look backat their season, there's some there's some
areas where they look at and theysee that, hey, in at this
time period, we could have beena little bit better. I could have
been a little stronger in this area. That would have propelled not only the
(21:22):
team but myself as a player toanother level. So there's a lot of
good character. There's a lot ofgood people, and it felt, like
you said, a real type groupand it formed a family. Steve Friday
Nights game came after the announcement ofthe MVP Award Friday morning, and I
(21:42):
maybe just reading into it, andI know that you know, he is
a professional, so he's not goingto say it. But I gotta believe
all you guys were bombed by theend result. Not because you think the
guy who won it, Dustin Wolfhad a Calgary wasn't deserving, but you
had a guy in your locker roomwho I'm imagining everybody thought was probably the
frontrunner or could have been, andthen he comes out with two goals in
(22:03):
an assist and I know they weren'tjust one on one breakaways and stuff like
that. You know they were developedplays. But uh, you know,
are we going to remember that gameas the Mike Carconey don't overlook me game
down the line, because you know, his presence was felt like it has
been all year in that victory ingame too. Yeah, quite quite possibly.
You know he was he's obviously aproud player, but you know,
(22:26):
I think you know, he wentthrough a lot this season. He went
through, you know, getting beingcalled up, having success and then being
sent down, and when he camedown, it didn't stop for him.
He continued on his journey and itwas tough for him. You know,
there were some times there where hethought he was going to get the next
call up and he didn't, andhe had the persevere and pushed through that,
(22:49):
and he played through it and hedid well and he kept scoring.
And then you know there's some somegames in there where obviously he's not feeling
his best, he's sick, andthen he has to go out and perform,
and you know, not only performfor himself, but he's got a
he knows that there's the playoffs lurking, he knows he's in a scoring title,
in a staring race. Those aren'teasy to to really actually push yourself
(23:12):
through. There's a lot of thoughtthat goes into it. And you know,
as as well as I do,when you when you have that much
knowledge of what's at stake, alot of times you can falter. And
it's it shows the strength of aperson that he was able to really persevere,
push through and and and finish theyear as a leading scorer. Now
(23:34):
you know, he's fully aware ofthe ability that Wolf has. In Calgary,
I think that team is is verysolid without Wolf, but with him
in the net, they're a firstplace hockey team. So he is a
difference maker. And I know Mike, you know, fully respects his ability,
and I suspect that there was alittle bit of internal motivation there to
(23:57):
really push him to that next nextlevel. But I think Mike wants to
win and this he knows that thisis the time of year that you know,
the best players have to show up, and when the best players show
up, your team has an opportunityto win. So I do believe that
without Mike, our team isn't thesame. And he did. He was
(24:19):
well deserving of the nominee and couldhave easily been the front runner. I
know, we I know, we'veseen Mike succeed at the NHL level,
But I'm going to ask this sortof in the the other half. You
know, almost glass has class halfempty way. So so, just for
argument's sake, what does Mike haveto do to be more than a quadruple
(24:40):
A level player, you know,than to establish himself full time at the
NHL level, Because he's proven atthe HL level that he's the top,
the cream of the crop, andso it's being able to stay at the
NHL level and then so on onthe same On the same note, um,
I know this is an unknown questionbecause he's an understricted free agent,
But am I wrong to think that, especially from the Tucson perspective, even
(25:02):
though he wants to probably play inan NHL level consistently, that if there's
a way to get him to comeback next year, you guys would want
to because I imagine that's what thefans would want to see. Oh.
Absolutely, we definitely want to seehim back in a Coyote uniform. You
know, if it's not with theRoadrunners, we definitely want to see him
in a Coyotes uniform, but nonethelessin our organization. But yeah, I
(25:22):
think Mike is a player that justhas to stay persistent and consistent with his
game. You know, he's obviouslya very dangerous player, and you know
he does it in a way thatnot many can. You know, there's
if you look back at the previousleading scorer and Tynan, He's he does
it completely different than Michael does.They have the same type of speed and
an offense. But Mike brings atype of game that not many scorers can
(25:47):
bring. He can fight, hecan really play physical. You got to
be on your toes defensively, andyou have to be aware of him all
the time because he can hit youand be physical. And you know what,
I think he's also a player thatis underrated in the D zone.
I don't think he gets a lotof credit for, you know, the
some of the details that he hasin the D zone and the attention that
(26:08):
he has. You know, Ithink at the end of the season,
there's some you know, there's somemoments where he achieved a little bit more
because it's uh, you know,it was a little bit on his mind
to get that title. But forfor I would say ninety of the season,
he played on the right side ofthe pop, played really well defensively,
and was rewarded with some offensive outputas well. Steve, it was
(26:32):
his third season with us, andwe got him before the twenty twenty one
campaign on loan from from Nashville.And at that point, you know,
you've seen him on video, you'veseen his stats on paper, you've you've
talked to folks about him, soyou have that understanding. But at what
point when he came into our lockerroom and became a roadrunner, became a
coyote, came with his family toTucson, did you think, all right,
(26:55):
this is a guy who can score, can maybe lead the league and
score. Worring can be a leaderon our team, and and and a
true a true road grinner. Whenwhen he's here and playing with us,
you know what it's um. Iremember our first year together during COVID.
I mean honestly, it sounds maybelike we're we're extending or you know,
(27:17):
reaching, but he may have hadthree or four breakaways a game. It
seemed like, you know, therewas some real clutch opportunities there and some
you know, you could see itin his skating and how he was able
to beat defenders one on one.You could see that there was going to
be you know that he had apotential to do it, you know,
and and we saw no reason whyhe couldn't really push himself past what he's
(27:41):
done in the in in years prior. But you know what he's uh,
he's a player that finally got achance to play in the NHL. And
when he had that chance to playin the NHL, that just propelled him
to another level. Really, youknow, once you play there and you
have a little bit of success,you then you know, bring that back
(28:02):
with you with the American Hockeyley witha little bit more confidence, and obviously
there's a little more peppin as stepand next thing, you know, you
know, goals are going into ahigher rate. And you know, he's
he was just he just had thatthat depth of belief in himself that he
could reach another level, and hedid. I think we saw another level
in our leadership in the playoffs.You know, our captain Adam krack Noo
(28:25):
and car Coney and and JS hadhad had a good playoff run last year.
And I'm looking at their stats careerin the playoffs and they don't always
match the regular season for for onereason or another different style of play,
right, But with Mike, withAdam, and with JS, who's on
a multi year deal, their playoffstats might have even been better than their
(28:49):
regular season stats as a whole.And I that was another moment when I
thought, boy, do we havethe right guys here? Yeah. Absolutely,
We're lucky to have Jazz for nextseason. He was obviously a real
offensive contributor, but he's another playerthat you know, and he's he can
operate, you know, a lotlike a penalty killer can or a player
(29:11):
that plays some real hard minutes inthe d zone. He's very structured,
he's hard on pox, so hehas the ability to really play both ends.
And then you got at him that'syou know, obviously well known for
being a leader, and he's thirtyseven years old this year and he had
a career year, so you know, just shows the type of commitment he
has to the game and you know, the passion that he has for the
(29:33):
game. It's hard to find aperson that's at his level on his age
and outperform his previous years. Sowe're definitely lucky to have those three.
And you know, you add Mikeinto that mix and next thing, you
know, we're a real team tobe reckoned with again next season. So
(29:55):
going back to kind of building theculture. Um, I was talking to
my brother about the season and Iasked them, you know, I told
him I was gonna be talking toyou. What questions do you have for
Steve? And one of my brothersasked, you know, if you can
feel how much TWUSN is behind you, can you this season in particular,
it seemed that the culture wasn't justbuilding that culture. That strong culture wasn't
(30:19):
just happening in the locker room.It was extending beyond and by you know,
by those final games of the season. You know, it just felt
like so electric in the TCC andit was curious, do you feel that,
Do you feel that the culture isgrowing? Oh? Yeah, you
could feel the energy, especially likeyou said, at the end of the
(30:40):
season, it just seemed like itwas building and building and building, and
it was it felt almost like aswe were getting better, the fans were
getting more connected with us, andyou know, the closer we got to
the playoffs, the tighter the bondwas between us and the fans. The
one thing we're disappointed are vision wasto you know, definitely get back to
(31:02):
Tucson and play a game in theplayoffs in front of our fans. That
was our our mission. That wasour vision. Um, it'll be again
that that same vision a mission fornext season. But we felt short.
Uh, you know, it's it'sit's unfortunate. But yeah, to your
question, for sure, we feltthere was a different bond and you could
(31:22):
see and feel the energy from thefans. There's no doubt about it.
So I want to I want toask you two questions. One is kind
of just a running high jinks wehave here on this show and on the
road Owners Insider podcast. We've talkedfor years. We joked with you about
it about back during the pandemic daysof Jimmy Peebles having to get you your
Wildcat Rap pregame. What was thebest pregame meal you had this season?
(31:48):
The best question? And then Ihave a follow up to that. That's
a that's a tough one. Youknow what. By that point, I
have no recollection or any idea ofwhat I'm eating or what I'm doing.
My focus is literally on the boysand what the you know, what the
plan is. So that that's agood question. I would probably be something
really boring that probably nobody else wouldprobably eat. It would probably be salad
(32:10):
with chicken so and then and thenthe follow up one kind of still fun
but more serious. What is yourfavorite moment from this season? Is it
a certain play? Is it agame? Is it a win? Is
it a something in the locker room? Can be anything? What was the
what's the one indelible moment about thisseason that stands out to you? Apparently
that was Kim's question too. She'sgesticulating wildly on cam right here. Kim,
(32:32):
do you want to finish asking thequestion? Can you go for you
ask it, see what was yourmost memorable moment? Yeah, uh so
I have two, one for Kimand one for Brett. All right,
So the two games in Colorado onthe road really stand out to us as
(32:52):
a team because I feel like thatactually propelled us to that next love them.
You could see our guys, they'rethey're fully aware of the how hard
it is to play in Colorado.That's a difficult team to play on the
road. Their fans are behind themas well, and it's a difficult place
(33:13):
to play. I don't think ourrecord, Adrian, you you're the Stag
group, but you know, Idon't think our record is very good there,
or at least I don't think wehave ever won back to back games
on the road in Colorado. Andthen for us to go in there and
really handed to him the first night, I think it was a five two
games something like that. It wasa high scoring game. And the next
(33:34):
seven seven one, seven one.Thank you. I wanted to make sure
you said it seven one. Sowe beat them, you know, handily.
And then a lot of times whenyou beat your opponents seven to one
at home the next night, it'sgoing to be a real dangerous night and
we were ready for him and weended up winning in overtime. Mike got
(33:54):
the game winner there. So thatwas definitely a weekend that stood out to
me. And then obviously the lastgame at home against Texas when we were
down by four and came back andclinched the playoffs. I mean, you
know, the guys were really preparedin that game, and you know,
it didn't come out. It didn'tIt didn't come out that we didn't come
(34:15):
out that way. We were downby four and then to come back in
the third period and score four unansweredto tie to get us to the playoffs
was it was a pretty big feeling. What's really interesting about that Colorado game
too, if you think about it, is the fact that you mentioned you
know, you guys have to winevery game. I mean, you guys
needed every point to get into theplayoffs. When the push came to shove,
you didn't know and couldn't predict.But if Carconi doesn't tie that up
(34:37):
with a minute and twenty seconds togo and doesn't win in overtime, you
guys aren't in the playoffs. Soto your point about that sweep in Colorado,
in hindsight, just absolutely monumental.Monumental for two reasons. It just
gave us that confidence that we canplay against anybody, and to have to
do it on the road as well. You know, our road record was
really good at the start of theyear, but it had started to lie
(35:00):
little. And then to go inat the end of the season and beat
you know, quite frankly a monsteron the road, that was pretty impactful
for us. And then in termsof clinching the playoffs, I actually just
showed you guys, I saved thePA announcement from when we clinched the playoffs.
I never thought about saving them fromfor you know, momentous events.
(35:20):
But I have that one sitting herewith me, and I don't know what
I'm gonna do with it. Butum next the yeah, yeah, So
that's my memory. From Steve's sharedmemory, you can have you can have
Colorado, Brett. Okay. Um, So, Steve, as you go
into the summer, I was curiouswhat your what the process is for the
organization in signing players, resigning freeagents, looking at the depth the depth
(35:43):
chart for prospects, how does thatwork? Yeah, for prospects, and
you know we're going to try tosign some some prospects that are you know,
under our we've drafted them and sothere are property until we're we signed
them. So we'll look at someof those from from the previous years and
then you know, from there we'lljust start to build and see what type
(36:04):
of free agency that are available andyou know, really start to pinpoint what's
important for us and how we're goingto get to another level. And you
know, I think for us,we're looking for you know, we want
talented players, there's no doubt,but first and foremost they have to be
good people. I feel like goodpeople they'll they'll fight for each other,
(36:24):
they'll fight hard for the room,and they'll want to be a part of
the community. Steve wrapping it uphere on road unders happy hour. I
mean, we never want to looktoo far ahead of ourselves. But any
any immediate plans for not coming tothe rink for practice every day, any
any short term you know, dayto day stuff that might be getting added
(36:47):
back to the routine now that thesunrise to sunset days are over for a
little bit. Yeah, it's ait's a really weird feeling when you're done,
you know, like you are you'rejust in this in this cycle and
you don't really ever get to reallypay attention to your body, your mind,
you know, how you're feeling,how you're gone, and then when
(37:09):
you're done, you're almost like,hey, what's next. You know,
you're still in that cycle right whenyou're when you finish, and it's it's
very anti climatic obviously when you don'twin. Uh, And so you know
when when you have a minute torest, you actually find out how actually
tired you are. And then nextthing you know, you're just you're you're
(37:29):
catching up on sleep and doing whatyou can to to just get flush again.
And so I can't wait to startexercising a little bit more and start
pushing the body a little bit pastwhat it's been going through in the last
couple of weeks. But I'm goingto spend a lot of time with my
family in the next couple of weeks. Here. I spent some time already
(37:50):
today with my oldest son golfing,so that was that was unique for the
season. We hadn't seen each otherin a long time, so it was
really great to see him and greatto spend time with him. But then
after the two weeks, it's it'sgonna be digging right back in I.
You know. Oddly enough, itdoesn't seem like there's that much time past
before you dig in. You know, you would think that you'd probably be
(38:13):
a few months before you start openingup the computer and digging into your team.
But we got to figure out thestrengths of you know, our team
and what we did well and whatwe need to improve on, and so
definitely going to be digging into thatand speaking with our analytics department with Chase
Glassberg and looking to you know,through a microscope to see where we can
(38:35):
improve. Well, Steve, weappreciate it. We hate to end the
interview because you just want to keeptalking road Runners Hockey. But but as
you said, uh, family time, family time a weight. So we
appreciate the twenty four and a halfminutes you just gave us on on road
Runner Tappy hour. You're always sogracious with your time. We love talking
to you, we love watching youlead our group. Great job on the
(38:58):
season, just another another great yearof development and winning games and building people,
and we appreciate it. And we'llcatch up soon during during the course
of the off season. Well onbehalf of all of the players and our
organization. Honestly, we can't thankyou guys enough for your support and what
you guys do for the road Runners, the community. I mean, it's
(39:21):
you guys are right beside us,and we feel that your presence and your
support and we certainly appreciate it tremendouslyand so thank you very much, and
we look forward to next season.Again, we do too. We can't
wait. Thanks to road Unders headcoach Steve Platman for joining us for a
good twenty five minutes or so hereon Happy Hour. If you missed any
of it, we'll have the HappyHour podcast on the iHeart Radio app coming
(39:44):
up right after the show. Let'sget to our final What are they talking
about? On the season? Thesetwo have been arguing back and forth,
not arguing, discussing. They werenot fighting. They were having a discussion
right on. Who is going tolead off? What are we talking about?
So we still have no idea?Let's start with let's we're traditionalists around
(40:05):
here. Okay, we're traditionalists.Let's stick to the routine. Nothing ever
changes for us. He is inhis fifth year covering the two Sun road
Runners. He digs up all thefun stories he finds all the fun facts.
Brett Farah, what's Brett talking about? Well, it's gonna be it's
really what's gonna come up and whatwe're gonna talk about. You know,
(40:27):
I expect you see some some goodcoverage this offseason from my guy James Kelly
at the Daily Star, and um, I'll probably try to try to support
that where I can in terms ofworking with you Adrian to to kind of
do some exit stuff. You know, we weren't there on Monday necessarily as
the team was getting ready to roll, but um into the offseason, but
you guys have always been incredibly supportiveof helping us kind of reach out to
(40:51):
some players as their offseasons get goingand uh and what they're doing. And
you know, I remember talking toit wasn't really an off season so to
speak. It kind of was.But talking to Braden Burke a couple of
years ago when he was at homein Edmonton. He was talking to me
and I'm just hearing this noise inthe background and like, what is that?
And he says, Oh, I'mjust working on my slapshots down in
the basement on the fake ice whilehe's got his earbuds and he's smacking the
(41:13):
fuck away, you know, andso just kind of learning what these guys
doing the offseason and stuff. SoI look forward to that. And if
you haven't read all the follow allthe lead up, I should say to
the last week of the season,James and I had had it covered from
all angles. A cool story thatJames did on Stephen Camphor last week,
and getting back to the playoffs,fun stories on Cochella at Cochella and what
that meant, and uh and JSDbeing the best dress man in show business
(41:37):
and uh and then obviously leading upinto the to the MVP announcement and and
you know, chronicling as how goodMike Carcony season was even with not winning
the MVP and what that meant,and hum, if I can share my
gratitude to the two of you.Hopefully this is not my last road Owners
Happy hour, but this is mylast road Owners Happy Hour as an employee
of The Daily Star. I mytime with The Star finished this week.
(42:01):
So I look forward to James continuing. And I don't plan to be a
part in many respects, whether Igot to find my own outlet or or
work along with the Roadrunners a littlemore closely and not say hey, since
I don't work for the Roadrunners,you know, but still do that I
will not be going away. Iwill be around in some capacity, but
but we still want to support Jamesand his efforts. I have all all
(42:22):
the hunch that he will he willbe on the beat full time next season.
So yeah, So it's it's beena it's been a great ride for
the last few years representing the Starand uh in Tucson dot Com. And
I thank everybody for reading. Andas soon as I know where you can
continue reading, you will find out. So wow'll just keep coming. I
(42:43):
can't. I can't do this emotionalup and down. I wanted you to
go first. I want to throwthat out there and be like be like,
what do you got Kim? Ohmy gosh, holy smokes. Well
Bret, Um, I'm gonna missyou. Um, but I'm excited to
see what I'm yeah, just notfor the Star. So what what I
am talking about for? I thinkthis is the first time I've gotten to
(43:05):
what's Kim talking about? All season? And I only have a few seconds.
I actually went out to lunch todayand I was walking and ran into
Cameron he big and um, justwanted to do a little shout out to
Cameron he Big. He was somuch fun to watch this season and he
just is such an incredibly dynamic player. He was somebody that I would text
(43:25):
my son during the game's watch him. Watch how much effort he's putting into
this one shift on the ice.And he gives that effort every single time
he's on the ice, and itwas absolutely just fascinating. The man is
focused and it was really interesting.So he had a chance to run into
him and tell him how much howentertaining he was this season. So yeah,
(43:49):
I just wanted to put that outthere. Really cool man. He's
the energizer Bunny, energizer Bunny sayingright, And I would I would get
to the arena like sometimes three hoursbefore the game and then leave like maybe
forty five minutes. He would bethere when I got there, and then
he'd still be there when I left, and then would just full tilt the
entire game, you know what,Like we talk about We've talked about this
(44:13):
before. Michael Bunting put it bestand he said, Tucson is a place
everyone loves to be, but nobodyin this business wants to be here,
and what he meant by that wasthat they're all pushing for that next level.
And Cam he Big knows who heis and where he is in his
career. Would he love an NHLshot, Sure, But like I got
the impression, he loved to behere every single day that he was here.
(44:34):
And there are some guys that maybethey don't, maybe they know they
need to be here, but youknow, and they like it, and
Tucsons wonderful. But but Cam heBig loved to be here and I hope
in some capacity that continues. Idon't know what his contract status is,
but I hope that that he's aroundbecause he's a lot of fun to watch.
I a Greek him. Yeah,and I echo what you just said.
So we'll be with you all summeron the Insider podcast, new episodes
(44:57):
dropping every Monday on the iHeart Rayappor two Sunroadrunners dot Com slash podcast.
Jimmy Peebles and myself and Breton Kimwill be along as well to keep things
moving, keep things fun in thesummer. Well you two. I opened
our season premiere of Happy Hour withthis back in October, our very first
(45:17):
show before we brought on general managerJohn Ferguson. We let him in on
the whole thing. Three headed sportsradio doesn't usually work. It does not
usually work. It doesn't matter whothe talent is. Fourheaded never works.
That's why Jimmy's not here. Thatis true. But but I think the
three of us pulled off three headedsports radio to the point where they'll they'll
(45:43):
have us back in our current currenttime slots. So great job by you
guys here Unhappy Hour. It wasa fun, fun season and we pushed
thirty episodes. They're all on theiHeartRadio app two Sun Roadrunners Happy Hour podcast.
Every episode there, every special guestsyou can you can check it out,
um and keep the keep the fungoing all summer, as we've decided
(46:07):
that that we will. I don'tknow if we're gonna do it in person
or virtually every Tuesday night at fiveo'clock, whether we're just gonna listen to
our own podcast virtually or together,or at an Applebee's or street Taco,
Street Taco. Kim I did notgo to Applebee's once in the Palm Desert
this past week. We were therefor six days, seven days. The
(46:35):
guy. I think the guys listenedto Happy Hour because every time food came
up, somebody a jab, youwant to go to Applebee's right right next
to the hotel. We were thereseven days, six nights. I did
not go Kim. I ate localevery night, with the exception of Saturday
(46:57):
night when I went to Morton's Steakhouseand UH and had the bar menu,
which was phenomenal. So everybody,thanks for joining us on Happy Hour this
season. We appreciate it. Fora lead broadcast producer Michael Goodrich and wrapping
up year number seven of Roadrunners Hockey, Kim coderrobos Grenferre, I'm Adrian Denny.
We'll talk to you on the Insiderpodcast all summer
Tucson Roadrunners Happy Hours open for pennythingbut business. Joined Adrian Denny, Bret
Vera, and kimda Roblas. It'san hour of hockey and high junes.
Kim sometimes jokes just write themselves.We'll have special guests every week and excited
now to bring on a special guestyour friend in mind, everybody, It's
(00:23):
always a good time on Roadrunners HappyHours. Good afternoon, everybody. Welcome
to the season finale of Roadrunners.Happy Hour here on Fox Sports fourteen fifty
am is straight up five o'clock onyour Tuesday afternoon with Brett Vera and Kim
Coda Roblas. I'm Adrian Denny,Roadwinners head coach Steve Popman will be our
special guests joining us coming up injust a few minutes here on our usual
(00:47):
Tuesday night get together Kim and Brett. Great to be back with you guys.
I was thinking about it. Canwe get through this without any tears?
I mean, it's it's not aseries finale, it's a season final,
Alley, We're going to all beback. But what are you gonna
do next Tuesday afternoon and the evening? Like, what are we gonna do?
(01:07):
What do people do on Tuesdays atfive when they're listen to us?
Do we go and listen to usin the car? Like? Is it
this wartex that you know the spacetime continuum freezes on us? What we've
got the podcast? We could gettogether and listen to us on the podcast
We've got We've I think we've gotI think this is like the twenty fifth
(01:30):
or twenty sixth addition a happy Hour. I couldn't believe we were pushing.
Yeah, we're we're pushing thirty.Uh so you've got you've got plenty to
go back and listen to. We'vebeen with you every week with a special
guest talking Roadrunners Hockey, and we'lltalk about it with head coach Steve Popman
coming up when he joins us.But guys, it's it's something when you
(01:56):
enter a day where you're winning anadvanced and moving on and planning to go
to Calgary and we're driving over theten on our way to the arena and
you're you're looking at it and you'relike, well, if this going a
bird hits the windshield, Okay,I mean this is this is my I'm
(02:23):
the journalist putting my hat on moment, the last one of the year.
But no, it's it's got tobe tough though, to to also feel
how great those two days must havefelt. And then you know it's a
tough start. But at the sametime, you're I can only imagine what
you're saying, Adrian, that you'reright. That like waking up that morning
on Sunday, that's that is,that is what sports is all about.
(02:43):
Yeah, And in a in ain a deciding game, right on,
one team was going to move on, one team was going to to move
on themselves. And so we're drivingdriving over the ten on our way to
the Actressure Arena on Sunday afternoon,and and we know, if we win,
we are going to take a right. Uh no, we're gonna take
(03:07):
a left and we're gonna go toLos Angeles and we're gonna fly to Calgary
on Monday. If we lose,we're gonna come back. We're gonna go
that way and we're gonna go backhome, which is usually where you want
to go, but but not inthis case. Yeah, Kim, I
screwed up all the all the directionsthere because you're you're coming from the opposite
way on the never Nevertheless, oneway was gonna go to Tucson, one
(03:30):
way it was gonna go to LosAngeles, and we ended up coming back
to Tucson. But that's how itwent. Roadrunners winning that game on on
Friday night, forcing the the gamethree in the playoff series. And and
and I'm thinking, we're in agood spot here because won the last game.
(03:51):
We're we've got forty eight hours tocome into the next one. I
felt that we had the better coachingstaff. I felt that we had a
team that had been test stood throughadversity, that had shown the ability to
beat good teams. And I feltthat we had a good team going up
against a team that had a goodyear with really good players, that was
(04:12):
a really good team that had notgone through adversity. So that that's why
I would have given the Roadrunners theedge going into that game. And in
the end, it was the teamwith the second best record in the league
that went into the final week ofthe regular season with a chance to have
the best record in the league onceagain with their experienced group, with their
(04:34):
veteran group again the Seattle Crack,and an organization that that's not really your
typical AHL team because much like Hendersona couple of years ago when they joined
the league under expansion Vegas, theyhave had time to draft develop. It's
not really a minor league team ofprospects. It's a minor league team of
(04:55):
guys you're going to call up ifthere's injury situations in Seattle. So that's
what we were kind of going upagainst a young organization and the Roadrunners and
the Coyotes with a really good coachingstaff that's been able to develop players and
get this team to overachieve and beatteams that were above them in the standings
and in first place. And inthe end it was Coachella Valley, the
(05:18):
experienced team able to capitalize on experience, turned some key moments into momentum situations.
They did at Wednesday, they wentup three nothing in the first nine
minutes, Roadrunners controlled rest of thegame. Friday, it was all Tucson
Sunday again, back to the momentumand a young team that wasn't quite able
to reel it in get the trainback on the tracks, and unfortunately that
(05:44):
was it in both games the Roadrunnerslost. It came down to the first
ten minutes. By the game Breadyou just paid a heck of a compliment
to Steve Poppin without even realizing it. You know, you talked about the
Roadrunners, in your opinion, havinga better coaching staff, more situationally prepared
coaching staff for that circumstance. AndI'm not disagreeing with that whatsoever. But
we got to remember the coach onthe other side of that bench is a
(06:05):
Stanley Cup winning coach who a formerPhoenix Roadrunner Dan a couple of seasons in
Phoenix as a Roadrunner. But thebut yeah, that that's you're you're not
wrong on that that you know they'rethey were built to do this Cachella Valley
was, and so to have anupstart team. You know, you and
I talked about this. Um,I hope it's okay, And I'm not
(06:26):
blowing the can open on something wetalked about when we're not on the record
or on the air, But youand I talked about this and kind of
the the frustration, not frustration withyou, but like the frustration over the
idea that, like, are peoplegoing to hang on the fact that the
Roadrunners are the only team making theplayoffs that are under five hundred And I
look at the positive side of that, I guess that you win that game
(06:47):
on Sunday, and it's not afluke. You're proving that, you know,
who cares what that record was.They played a gauntlet of a schedule
against a lot of good teams.There's a reason seven of the ten and
all six major HL awards came fromthe Pacific Division. And we could have
argued that even if Mike Carcony beatDustin Wolf for the MVP, it's still
a Pacific Division awards. So Ithink all of that played a factor in
(07:09):
the Roadrunners being ready and tested.I said this, you know, in
my final story for The Star onSunday about the season, that this team
had been playing playoff hockey for threemonths and very few teams can claim that.
Maybe Bakersfield and maybe San Jose becausethat's who was above them and who
was below them for almost all ofthose three months. But other than that,
(07:30):
everyone else was kind of going throughthe motions of their season and playing
well but not getting tested like that. And so to see what the road
Runners were able to do in Gametwo on Friday, it didn't start well
and that's the problem, but theyplayed two and a half good periods on
Sunday. It just came after arough ten minutes. And here's why I
say I give the edge to theRoadrunners coaching staff over a Stanley Cup winner
(07:50):
in Dan Bilesma, who's had agreat career. He's a good coach,
he did a great job with thatgroup of veterans. But the road Runners
coaches Steve Potman, John Slaney,Zach Startini, they've been adjusting on the
fly every week in Stephen John's case, for the last six years. Albeit
(08:11):
seventeen eighteen that team was was assembledtogether for most of the year eighteen nineteen
again kinda nineteen twenty kind of yeah, it was twenty one, twenty two,
twenty two, twenty three. Asas the Coyotes have started, their
process has been constant readjustment. Andwe've seen the Roadrunners with the constant readjustment
(08:39):
consistently been able to compete, comeout, adjust game plans, adjust lineups,
still have success. Has it beenthe success that Coachella Valley had Calgary
had, no? But but relativelyspeaking, that's uh, that's a lot,
uh, a lot of moving piecesfor for some really smart guys that
(09:05):
they've been able to keep going andand and and you look at so the
XS and o's aspect. We're goingto talk to Steve coming up in just
a few minutes. There's the personalaspect, the motivational aspect, and and
you'll hear it, folks when whenwe talk to Steve and if this guy's
giving you a game plan and alsodeveloping you individually for the nhl' you're gonna
(09:31):
see why we we can say withoutgiving any any kind of you know,
comparison to Dan Bilesma, while we'lltake why we take our group in any
day of the week and why it'sso exciting as you look at the progress
we made, you know, thelast two years. We last season winning
(09:54):
percentage improved from the season before,this season, seven more wins in the
year before, and you kind oflook at this kind of year number three
of this generation of Roadrunners and improvetheir wins, qualified for the playoffs,
and I think it's a team thatachieved success. Doesn't doesn't take away one
(10:15):
thing, Kim, how you meand Charlie felt Me, Kim and Roadrunners
goaltender development coach Charlie McTavish, we'reall together, um, Friday night and
Sunday night. It was great tohave Kim in town and joining me and
Charlie. But we went through thehighs on Friday, we went through the
lows on Sunday, and Kim,it didn't take away any of the pain,
(10:35):
any of the heartbreak that we werein a deciding game three with a
chance to move on. Even thoughyou look at the first seventy two games
the regular season, the first twoplayoff games, that's a that's a huge
success. And I'll tell you this, Kim, I am just as glad
that you were there with us onSunday as I was to have you with
us for the victory on Friday.I was so excited to be there.
(10:58):
Very it was hard, it washeartbreaking, it was Yeah, I don't
even know how to describe it.But when you talk about the progress that
this team has made, they trulyare a development team. And you see
this in the growth of the players. The players who have been with us,
you know for a few years,like Um, you know, like
Yan, Yeah, like Key Big, you know, you you see them
(11:20):
get better and better and better,and you're just waiting for them to get
to that that next level. Andthen all we have all these call ups
this year, I'm sure next yearis going to be, you know,
just as frantic and insane with themneeding the talent that we have here.
And one of the things that Iwanted to talk about too was I obviously
had not been to an away gamethis season. In fact, ever,
(11:43):
I don't think so. This wasmy first experience and an accressher is really
loud. I don't know if youguys can can get it how loud it
is over HLTV, but I'm losingmy voice a little bit, and I
honestly think it's just from trying totalk to you, Adrian, and early
during the game, just trying toyell so that you could hear me because
it was so Their PA system isincredibly loud, the music cloud, the
(12:07):
fans are constantly doing something so andI want to ask Steve about it in
a little bit, like how muchof an effect that has on the team,
especially when we're behind so quickly ina game like that like that was
very, very difficult scene the entirething, Kim, I wanted to ask
you about Friday Night's game in particularly, I know I agree with what Adrian
(12:28):
said that you know, I wasn'tthere, but I think that's a very
sweet thing to say about having youknow you there for Sunday compared to Friday,
because it was the experiences are different, but there it's a totality of
the season and you are such animportant part, not just on this show,
but obviously you're roll during home gamesthat you know, you see this
(12:50):
team literally closer than any of usdo. And I wanted to ask you,
you know, I'm watching it onHLTV on Friday. I could not
get a hotel in Cachella Valley duringunderstand I heard, I heard it took
you a little bit of a trekto get to get up. I tend
to get to the game because itjust I think you said you were going
to LA and probably you know savedsaved significant dollars doing so. Um,
(13:15):
But watching that game Friday that youknow, I know, I know Cochella
Valley crawled back in it. Butthe Roadrunners looked so good out of the
gates on Friday, like I was. I was more impressed with that first
thirty five forty minutes than just aboutany game I've seen all year, considering
the circumstances do or die, consideringplaying in an arena like that in front
(13:37):
of a crowd like that and againstthe team that's you know all year in
one or two in the league.I want to know if you saw that
too from from in person, becauseagain EBVW is a little different, but
it was eye opening to me towatch how fast Tucson came out in that
game. Yeah, that was.It was fantastic and it was so energizing,
(13:58):
and it was Adrian, I'm sureused to this, but I'm not.
I'm not used to being like theonly one in the stands of like
me and one other guy who's cheeringfor the Roadrunners, um in it was.
Yeah, it was absolutely it wasgreat to see that team on Friday
night. That was a lot offun, Absolutely fantastic. Joining us now
our special guest, the head coachof the Tucson road Runners, Steve Popman.
(14:20):
Steve, Welcome to Happy Hour.Great to have you as always,
good to see you all. Goodto see you all. I wish we're
under different circumstances, but nevertheless,it's good to see you well. Steve.
It's it's it's it's heartbreaking right tolose in the playoffs. It's uh,
it's you go into it, yougo all in and then I don't
(14:43):
know, have you gotten to thepart yet of the process where you're able
to look back at the seventy twogame regular season from a team standpoint,
from a development standpoint, from ahockey development standpoint, and Tucson and say,
boy, that was a heck ofa year. And we're proud of
because because we're proud of you.But at the same time, we know
what it's like to have to havethe season end just like that and have
(15:05):
your heart broken with a with agroup that that you love. We we
did have a chance to to lookin a little bit. Obviously, we
had our end of the season meetingsand those are always difficult after losing in
the first round. It's like yousaid, we did do some really good
things. It was a difficult year. There were some barriers we had to
overcome. We saw a lot ofplayers go up and down throughout the season.
(15:31):
There was definitely some some development anduh, you know that's that's going
to be ongoing. But you knowwhat we're we're not satisfied with the with
the end result is. You know, I'm sure everybody on this panel feels
the same. You know, weum we definitely showed that we can play
and compete against anyone, and it'sjust about being consistent and and doing it
(15:54):
over a longer period and definitely overa longer stretch during the play us,
Steve, we started the show todaybefore you joined us with Adrian kind of
talking about what it was like wakingup Sunday and having the knowledge of,
like, what was the potential today? And I recognize it didn't end how
(16:14):
you guys wanted or planned, butbut what was that like for you?
Especially considering where this organization has beenthe last few years, considering that the
best possible chance to win a playoffseries since twenty eighteen, the season gets
cut short and then you know,it's been a battle to get back to
this point, and I just wantedto know after the success you guys saw
Friday, was what was Sunday morningand kind of getting getting to game time
(16:37):
like for you, you know,there's probably some anxiety, but also there's
got to be a lot of excitementto know what you guys are capable of
doing. And you know, youguys lost the game, but we all
know that that could have gone anyother different direction. If a puck bounce
is a different way to start itoff. So I'd love to hear from
you how how that day started foryou. Yeah, there's definitely some excitement.
(16:59):
Honestly, that I was one ofthe nights. I slept the best
the night before. Ironically, usuallythere's not a lot of sleep the night
before, but I think to thatpoint there's been so much adrenaline and you
know, if you're you're up atnight trying to get that next win.
And it was ironic that we wereable to sleep a little bit better the
night before the game. But itwas a three o'clock start, so waking
(17:22):
up, we had a lot ofenergy. We were ready to go,
and to be honest with you,the rhythm felt a little bit off,
you know, being at three o'clockgame. We had to several buses for
different times for breakfast, and there'sa little bit of a distraction. But
nevertheless, we were we were excited, and we were prepared and uh,
(17:44):
you know, and unfortunately we gotoff to a shaky startup. But I
think it had a lot to dowith how badly we wanted it. You
know, in our coverage, wewent in double and it you know,
it freed up a man in theslot and they were able to get it
to him, and you know,it just showed how I guess how on
our toes we were. We youknow, we just over extended ourselves a
(18:06):
little bit and like I said,it freed up a man in the slot
and end up in the back ofthe net and then you know what to
try to get back after you know, four straight goals. It was.
It was difficult. Our guys didn'tquit. We didn't you know, obviously
we didn't give up a goal atthat point. But I'm proud of our
guys. They they they accomplished alot this year. They had to go
(18:27):
through, like I said earlier,some barriers and you know what, we
got to our goal. We justfell a little bit short. So Steve
um I don't know why this yearis so much more difficult for me than
previous years, but maybe the guysjust seem like so much more of a
(18:48):
cocisive unit, so much more.You seem to be having so much more
fun together, um So, andyou can see it. You could see
how hard they were working in everygame to make it happen. So I'm
curious. One of the things thatwe've talked about with a few of the
players is how emotionally intelligent you arehow you're a players coach, And I
(19:10):
was curious. I asked Adam lastweek about the psychology of players coming up
and down and having to constantly readjustfor that. How did you manage that
on a coaching level? What wasthat like, you know, with losing
players and then having guys in andout and having to readjust lines, you
know, pretty consistently for months andmonths. Yeah, that's it's it's difficult,
(19:34):
especially when you know at the endof the season when we got players
back from the NHL that we're upfor some time. I think that was
the toughest because you know, it'sit's like you said, there's those relationships
and you know, we had there'sa bond being formed with the guys that
were there that had to really pushand when you have to push together and
(19:57):
you have success together there, youknow, it's you do create that bond.
And there's a lot of people anda lot of players with character in
our locker room, and so youknow, those relationships are tied real tight
when you have that type of characterin the locker room, and you know
what, to Brett's point, ithad been a long time since we had
(20:19):
been there and the guys were fightingreally hard to bring our our our team
back there and to record and werecognize that we wanted to build the culture
here and so it gave us anopportunity to do that, and the guys
just seemed real excited to go throughwith it and really try to build something.
(20:41):
And that's now we have to lookat last season as as the start
of something, and so we haveto, you know, continue on forward
and look for ways to improve.And you know, there's a lot of
areas last season personally as a coach, as a coaching staff will make improvements.
(21:02):
And then you know there's some playersin the locker room that also would
you know, if they look backat their season, there's some there's some
areas where they look at and theysee that, hey, in at this
time period, we could have beena little bit better. I could have
been a little stronger in this area. That would have propelled not only the
(21:22):
team but myself as a player toanother level. So there's a lot of
good character. There's a lot ofgood people, and it felt, like
you said, a real type groupand it formed a family. Steve Friday
Nights game came after the announcement ofthe MVP Award Friday morning, and I
(21:42):
maybe just reading into it, andI know that you know, he is
a professional, so he's not goingto say it. But I gotta believe
all you guys were bombed by theend result. Not because you think the
guy who won it, Dustin Wolfhad a Calgary wasn't deserving, but you
had a guy in your locker roomwho I'm imagining everybody thought was probably the
frontrunner or could have been, andthen he comes out with two goals in
(22:03):
an assist and I know they weren'tjust one on one breakaways and stuff like
that. You know they were developedplays. But uh, you know,
are we going to remember that gameas the Mike Carconey don't overlook me game
down the line, because you know, his presence was felt like it has
been all year in that victory ingame too. Yeah, quite quite possibly.
You know he was he's obviously aproud player, but you know,
(22:26):
I think you know, he wentthrough a lot this season. He went
through, you know, getting beingcalled up, having success and then being
sent down, and when he camedown, it didn't stop for him.
He continued on his journey and itwas tough for him. You know,
there were some times there where hethought he was going to get the next
call up and he didn't, andhe had the persevere and pushed through that,
(22:49):
and he played through it and hedid well and he kept scoring.
And then you know there's some somegames in there where obviously he's not feeling
his best, he's sick, andthen he has to go out and perform,
and you know, not only performfor himself, but he's got a
he knows that there's the playoffs lurking, he knows he's in a scoring title,
in a staring race. Those aren'teasy to to really actually push yourself
(23:12):
through. There's a lot of thoughtthat goes into it. And you know,
as as well as I do,when you when you have that much
knowledge of what's at stake, alot of times you can falter. And
it's it shows the strength of aperson that he was able to really persevere,
push through and and and finish theyear as a leading scorer. Now
(23:34):
you know, he's fully aware ofthe ability that Wolf has. In Calgary,
I think that team is is verysolid without Wolf, but with him
in the net, they're a firstplace hockey team. So he is a
difference maker. And I know Mike, you know, fully respects his ability,
and I suspect that there was alittle bit of internal motivation there to
(23:57):
really push him to that next nextlevel. But I think Mike wants to
win and this he knows that thisis the time of year that you know,
the best players have to show up, and when the best players show
up, your team has an opportunityto win. So I do believe that
without Mike, our team isn't thesame. And he did. He was
(24:19):
well deserving of the nominee and couldhave easily been the front runner. I
know, we I know, we'veseen Mike succeed at the NHL level,
But I'm going to ask this sortof in the the other half. You
know, almost glass has class halfempty way. So so, just for
argument's sake, what does Mike haveto do to be more than a quadruple
(24:40):
A level player, you know,than to establish himself full time at the
NHL level, Because he's proven atthe HL level that he's the top,
the cream of the crop, andso it's being able to stay at the
NHL level and then so on onthe same On the same note, um,
I know this is an unknown questionbecause he's an understricted free agent,
But am I wrong to think that, especially from the Tucson perspective, even
(25:02):
though he wants to probably play inan NHL level consistently, that if there's
a way to get him to comeback next year, you guys would want
to because I imagine that's what thefans would want to see. Oh.
Absolutely, we definitely want to seehim back in a Coyote uniform. You
know, if it's not with theRoadrunners, we definitely want to see him
in a Coyotes uniform, but nonethelessin our organization. But yeah, I
(25:22):
think Mike is a player that justhas to stay persistent and consistent with his
game. You know, he's obviouslya very dangerous player, and you know
he does it in a way thatnot many can. You know, there's
if you look back at the previousleading scorer and Tynan, He's he does
it completely different than Michael does.They have the same type of speed and
an offense. But Mike brings atype of game that not many scorers can
(25:47):
bring. He can fight, hecan really play physical. You got to
be on your toes defensively, andyou have to be aware of him all
the time because he can hit youand be physical. And you know what,
I think he's also a player thatis underrated in the D zone.
I don't think he gets a lotof credit for, you know, the
some of the details that he hasin the D zone and the attention that
(26:08):
he has. You know, Ithink at the end of the season,
there's some you know, there's somemoments where he achieved a little bit more
because it's uh, you know,it was a little bit on his mind
to get that title. But forfor I would say ninety of the season,
he played on the right side ofthe pop, played really well defensively,
and was rewarded with some offensive outputas well. Steve, it was
(26:32):
his third season with us, andwe got him before the twenty twenty one
campaign on loan from from Nashville.And at that point, you know,
you've seen him on video, you'veseen his stats on paper, you've you've
talked to folks about him, soyou have that understanding. But at what
point when he came into our lockerroom and became a roadrunner, became a
coyote, came with his family toTucson, did you think, all right,
(26:55):
this is a guy who can score, can maybe lead the league and
score. Worring can be a leaderon our team, and and and a
true a true road grinner. Whenwhen he's here and playing with us,
you know what it's um. Iremember our first year together during COVID.
I mean honestly, it sounds maybelike we're we're extending or you know,
(27:17):
reaching, but he may have hadthree or four breakaways a game. It
seemed like, you know, therewas some real clutch opportunities there and some
you know, you could see itin his skating and how he was able
to beat defenders one on one.You could see that there was going to
be you know that he had apotential to do it, you know,
and and we saw no reason whyhe couldn't really push himself past what he's
(27:41):
done in the in in years prior. But you know what he's uh,
he's a player that finally got achance to play in the NHL. And
when he had that chance to playin the NHL, that just propelled him
to another level. Really, youknow, once you play there and you
have a little bit of success,you then you know, bring that back
(28:02):
with you with the American Hockeyley witha little bit more confidence, and obviously
there's a little more peppin as stepand next thing, you know, you
know, goals are going into ahigher rate. And you know, he's
he was just he just had thatthat depth of belief in himself that he
could reach another level, and hedid. I think we saw another level
in our leadership in the playoffs.You know, our captain Adam krack Noo
(28:25):
and car Coney and and JS hadhad had a good playoff run last year.
And I'm looking at their stats careerin the playoffs and they don't always
match the regular season for for onereason or another different style of play,
right, But with Mike, withAdam, and with JS, who's on
a multi year deal, their playoffstats might have even been better than their
(28:49):
regular season stats as a whole.And I that was another moment when I
thought, boy, do we havethe right guys here? Yeah. Absolutely,
We're lucky to have Jazz for nextseason. He was obviously a real
offensive contributor, but he's another playerthat you know, and he's he can
operate, you know, a lotlike a penalty killer can or a player
(29:11):
that plays some real hard minutes inthe d zone. He's very structured,
he's hard on pox, so hehas the ability to really play both ends.
And then you got at him that'syou know, obviously well known for
being a leader, and he's thirtyseven years old this year and he had
a career year, so you know, just shows the type of commitment he
has to the game and you know, the passion that he has for the
(29:33):
game. It's hard to find aperson that's at his level on his age
and outperform his previous years. Sowe're definitely lucky to have those three.
And you know, you add Mikeinto that mix and next thing, you
know, we're a real team tobe reckoned with again next season. So
(29:55):
going back to kind of building theculture. Um, I was talking to
my brother about the season and Iasked them, you know, I told
him I was gonna be talking toyou. What questions do you have for
Steve? And one of my brothersasked, you know, if you can
feel how much TWUSN is behind you, can you this season in particular,
it seemed that the culture wasn't justbuilding that culture. That strong culture wasn't
(30:19):
just happening in the locker room.It was extending beyond and by you know,
by those final games of the season. You know, it just felt
like so electric in the TCC andit was curious, do you feel that,
Do you feel that the culture isgrowing? Oh? Yeah, you
could feel the energy, especially likeyou said, at the end of the
(30:40):
season, it just seemed like itwas building and building and building, and
it was it felt almost like aswe were getting better, the fans were
getting more connected with us, andyou know, the closer we got to
the playoffs, the tighter the bondwas between us and the fans. The
one thing we're disappointed are vision wasto you know, definitely get back to
(31:02):
Tucson and play a game in theplayoffs in front of our fans. That
was our our mission. That wasour vision. Um, it'll be again
that that same vision a mission fornext season. But we felt short.
Uh, you know, it's it'sit's unfortunate. But yeah, to your
question, for sure, we feltthere was a different bond and you could
(31:22):
see and feel the energy from thefans. There's no doubt about it.
So I want to I want toask you two questions. One is kind
of just a running high jinks wehave here on this show and on the
road Owners Insider podcast. We've talkedfor years. We joked with you about
it about back during the pandemic daysof Jimmy Peebles having to get you your
Wildcat Rap pregame. What was thebest pregame meal you had this season?
(31:48):
The best question? And then Ihave a follow up to that. That's
a that's a tough one. Youknow what. By that point, I
have no recollection or any idea ofwhat I'm eating or what I'm doing.
My focus is literally on the boysand what the you know, what the
plan is. So that that's agood question. I would probably be something
really boring that probably nobody else wouldprobably eat. It would probably be salad
(32:10):
with chicken so and then and thenthe follow up one kind of still fun
but more serious. What is yourfavorite moment from this season? Is it
a certain play? Is it agame? Is it a win? Is
it a something in the locker room? Can be anything? What was the
what's the one indelible moment about thisseason that stands out to you? Apparently
that was Kim's question too. She'sgesticulating wildly on cam right here. Kim,
(32:32):
do you want to finish asking thequestion? Can you go for you
ask it, see what was yourmost memorable moment? Yeah, uh so
I have two, one for Kimand one for Brett. All right,
So the two games in Colorado onthe road really stand out to us as
(32:52):
a team because I feel like thatactually propelled us to that next love them.
You could see our guys, they'rethey're fully aware of the how hard
it is to play in Colorado.That's a difficult team to play on the
road. Their fans are behind themas well, and it's a difficult place
(33:13):
to play. I don't think ourrecord, Adrian, you you're the Stag
group, but you know, Idon't think our record is very good there,
or at least I don't think wehave ever won back to back games
on the road in Colorado. Andthen for us to go in there and
really handed to him the first night, I think it was a five two
games something like that. It wasa high scoring game. And the next
(33:34):
seven seven one, seven one.Thank you. I wanted to make sure
you said it seven one. Sowe beat them, you know, handily.
And then a lot of times whenyou beat your opponents seven to one
at home the next night, it'sgoing to be a real dangerous night and
we were ready for him and weended up winning in overtime. Mike got
(33:54):
the game winner there. So thatwas definitely a weekend that stood out to
me. And then obviously the lastgame at home against Texas when we were
down by four and came back andclinched the playoffs. I mean, you
know, the guys were really preparedin that game, and you know,
it didn't come out. It didn'tIt didn't come out that we didn't come
(34:15):
out that way. We were downby four and then to come back in
the third period and score four unansweredto tie to get us to the playoffs
was it was a pretty big feeling. What's really interesting about that Colorado game
too, if you think about it, is the fact that you mentioned you
know, you guys have to winevery game. I mean, you guys
needed every point to get into theplayoffs. When the push came to shove,
you didn't know and couldn't predict.But if Carconi doesn't tie that up
(34:37):
with a minute and twenty seconds togo and doesn't win in overtime, you
guys aren't in the playoffs. Soto your point about that sweep in Colorado,
in hindsight, just absolutely monumental.Monumental for two reasons. It just
gave us that confidence that we canplay against anybody, and to have to
do it on the road as well. You know, our road record was
really good at the start of theyear, but it had started to lie
(35:00):
little. And then to go inat the end of the season and beat
you know, quite frankly a monsteron the road, that was pretty impactful
for us. And then in termsof clinching the playoffs, I actually just
showed you guys, I saved thePA announcement from when we clinched the playoffs.
I never thought about saving them fromfor you know, momentous events.
(35:20):
But I have that one sitting herewith me, and I don't know what
I'm gonna do with it. Butum next the yeah, yeah, So
that's my memory. From Steve's sharedmemory, you can have you can have
Colorado, Brett. Okay. Um, So, Steve, as you go
into the summer, I was curiouswhat your what the process is for the
organization in signing players, resigning freeagents, looking at the depth the depth
(35:43):
chart for prospects, how does thatwork? Yeah, for prospects, and
you know we're going to try tosign some some prospects that are you know,
under our we've drafted them and sothere are property until we're we signed
them. So we'll look at someof those from from the previous years and
then you know, from there we'lljust start to build and see what type
(36:04):
of free agency that are available andyou know, really start to pinpoint what's
important for us and how we're goingto get to another level. And you
know, I think for us,we're looking for you know, we want
talented players, there's no doubt,but first and foremost they have to be
good people. I feel like goodpeople they'll they'll fight for each other,
(36:24):
they'll fight hard for the room,and they'll want to be a part of
the community. Steve wrapping it uphere on road unders happy hour. I
mean, we never want to looktoo far ahead of ourselves. But any
any immediate plans for not coming tothe rink for practice every day, any
any short term you know, dayto day stuff that might be getting added
(36:47):
back to the routine now that thesunrise to sunset days are over for a
little bit. Yeah, it's ait's a really weird feeling when you're done,
you know, like you are you'rejust in this in this cycle and
you don't really ever get to reallypay attention to your body, your mind,
you know, how you're feeling,how you're gone, and then when
(37:09):
you're done, you're almost like,hey, what's next. You know,
you're still in that cycle right whenyou're when you finish, and it's it's
very anti climatic obviously when you don'twin. Uh, And so you know
when when you have a minute torest, you actually find out how actually
tired you are. And then nextthing you know, you're just you're you're
(37:29):
catching up on sleep and doing whatyou can to to just get flush again.
And so I can't wait to startexercising a little bit more and start
pushing the body a little bit pastwhat it's been going through in the last
couple of weeks. But I'm goingto spend a lot of time with my
family in the next couple of weeks. Here. I spent some time already
(37:50):
today with my oldest son golfing,so that was that was unique for the
season. We hadn't seen each otherin a long time, so it was
really great to see him and greatto spend time with him. But then
after the two weeks, it's it'sgonna be digging right back in I.
You know. Oddly enough, itdoesn't seem like there's that much time past
before you dig in. You know, you would think that you'd probably be
(38:13):
a few months before you start openingup the computer and digging into your team.
But we got to figure out thestrengths of you know, our team
and what we did well and whatwe need to improve on, and so
definitely going to be digging into thatand speaking with our analytics department with Chase
Glassberg and looking to you know,through a microscope to see where we can
(38:35):
improve. Well, Steve, weappreciate it. We hate to end the
interview because you just want to keeptalking road Runners Hockey. But but as
you said, uh, family time, family time a weight. So we
appreciate the twenty four and a halfminutes you just gave us on on road
Runner Tappy hour. You're always sogracious with your time. We love talking
to you, we love watching youlead our group. Great job on the
(38:58):
season, just another another great yearof development and winning games and building people,
and we appreciate it. And we'llcatch up soon during during the course
of the off season. Well onbehalf of all of the players and our
organization. Honestly, we can't thankyou guys enough for your support and what
you guys do for the road Runners, the community. I mean, it's
(39:21):
you guys are right beside us,and we feel that your presence and your
support and we certainly appreciate it tremendouslyand so thank you very much, and
we look forward to next season.Again, we do too. We can't
wait. Thanks to road Unders headcoach Steve Platman for joining us for a
good twenty five minutes or so hereon Happy Hour. If you missed any
of it, we'll have the HappyHour podcast on the iHeart Radio app coming
(39:44):
up right after the show. Let'sget to our final What are they talking
about? On the season? Thesetwo have been arguing back and forth,
not arguing, discussing. They werenot fighting. They were having a discussion
right on. Who is going tolead off? What are we talking about?
So we still have no idea?Let's start with let's we're traditionalists around
(40:05):
here. Okay, we're traditionalists.Let's stick to the routine. Nothing ever
changes for us. He is inhis fifth year covering the two Sun road
Runners. He digs up all thefun stories he finds all the fun facts.
Brett Farah, what's Brett talking about? Well, it's gonna be it's
really what's gonna come up and whatwe're gonna talk about. You know,
(40:27):
I expect you see some some goodcoverage this offseason from my guy James Kelly
at the Daily Star, and um, I'll probably try to try to support
that where I can in terms ofworking with you Adrian to to kind of
do some exit stuff. You know, we weren't there on Monday necessarily as
the team was getting ready to roll, but um into the offseason, but
you guys have always been incredibly supportiveof helping us kind of reach out to
(40:51):
some players as their offseasons get goingand uh and what they're doing. And
you know, I remember talking toit wasn't really an off season so to
speak. It kind of was.But talking to Braden Burke a couple of
years ago when he was at homein Edmonton. He was talking to me
and I'm just hearing this noise inthe background and like, what is that?
And he says, Oh, I'mjust working on my slapshots down in
the basement on the fake ice whilehe's got his earbuds and he's smacking the
(41:13):
fuck away, you know, andso just kind of learning what these guys
doing the offseason and stuff. SoI look forward to that. And if
you haven't read all the follow allthe lead up, I should say to
the last week of the season,James and I had had it covered from
all angles. A cool story thatJames did on Stephen Camphor last week,
and getting back to the playoffs,fun stories on Cochella at Cochella and what
that meant, and uh and JSDbeing the best dress man in show business
(41:37):
and uh and then obviously leading upinto the to the MVP announcement and and
you know, chronicling as how goodMike Carcony season was even with not winning
the MVP and what that meant,and hum, if I can share my
gratitude to the two of you.Hopefully this is not my last road Owners
Happy hour, but this is mylast road Owners Happy Hour as an employee
of The Daily Star. I mytime with The Star finished this week.
(42:01):
So I look forward to James continuing. And I don't plan to be a
part in many respects, whether Igot to find my own outlet or or
work along with the Roadrunners a littlemore closely and not say hey, since
I don't work for the Roadrunners,you know, but still do that I
will not be going away. Iwill be around in some capacity, but
but we still want to support Jamesand his efforts. I have all all
(42:22):
the hunch that he will he willbe on the beat full time next season.
So yeah, So it's it's beena it's been a great ride for
the last few years representing the Starand uh in Tucson dot Com. And
I thank everybody for reading. Andas soon as I know where you can
continue reading, you will find out. So wow'll just keep coming. I
(42:43):
can't. I can't do this emotionalup and down. I wanted you to
go first. I want to throwthat out there and be like be like,
what do you got Kim? Ohmy gosh, holy smokes. Well
Bret, Um, I'm gonna missyou. Um, but I'm excited to
see what I'm yeah, just notfor the Star. So what what I
am talking about for? I thinkthis is the first time I've gotten to
(43:05):
what's Kim talking about? All season? And I only have a few seconds.
I actually went out to lunch todayand I was walking and ran into
Cameron he big and um, justwanted to do a little shout out to
Cameron he Big. He was somuch fun to watch this season and he
just is such an incredibly dynamic player. He was somebody that I would text
(43:25):
my son during the game's watch him. Watch how much effort he's putting into
this one shift on the ice.And he gives that effort every single time
he's on the ice, and itwas absolutely just fascinating. The man is
focused and it was really interesting.So he had a chance to run into
him and tell him how much howentertaining he was this season. So yeah,
(43:49):
I just wanted to put that outthere. Really cool man. He's
the energizer Bunny, energizer Bunny sayingright, And I would I would get
to the arena like sometimes three hoursbefore the game and then leave like maybe
forty five minutes. He would bethere when I got there, and then
he'd still be there when I left, and then would just full tilt the
entire game, you know what,Like we talk about We've talked about this
(44:13):
before. Michael Bunting put it bestand he said, Tucson is a place
everyone loves to be, but nobodyin this business wants to be here,
and what he meant by that wasthat they're all pushing for that next level.
And Cam he Big knows who heis and where he is in his
career. Would he love an NHLshot, Sure, But like I got
the impression, he loved to behere every single day that he was here.
(44:34):
And there are some guys that maybethey don't, maybe they know they
need to be here, but youknow, and they like it, and
Tucsons wonderful. But but Cam heBig loved to be here and I hope
in some capacity that continues. Idon't know what his contract status is,
but I hope that that he's aroundbecause he's a lot of fun to watch.
I a Greek him. Yeah,and I echo what you just said.
So we'll be with you all summeron the Insider podcast, new episodes
(44:57):
dropping every Monday on the iHeart Rayappor two Sunroadrunners dot Com slash podcast.
Jimmy Peebles and myself and Breton Kimwill be along as well to keep things
moving, keep things fun in thesummer. Well you two. I opened
our season premiere of Happy Hour withthis back in October, our very first
(45:17):
show before we brought on general managerJohn Ferguson. We let him in on
the whole thing. Three headed sportsradio doesn't usually work. It does not
usually work. It doesn't matter whothe talent is. Fourheaded never works.
That's why Jimmy's not here. Thatis true. But but I think the
three of us pulled off three headedsports radio to the point where they'll they'll
(45:43):
have us back in our current currenttime slots. So great job by you
guys here Unhappy Hour. It wasa fun, fun season and we pushed
thirty episodes. They're all on theiHeartRadio app two Sun Roadrunners Happy Hour podcast.
Every episode there, every special guestsyou can you can check it out,
um and keep the keep the fungoing all summer, as we've decided
(46:07):
that that we will. I don'tknow if we're gonna do it in person
or virtually every Tuesday night at fiveo'clock, whether we're just gonna listen to
our own podcast virtually or together,or at an Applebee's or street Taco,
Street Taco. Kim I did notgo to Applebee's once in the Palm Desert
this past week. We were therefor six days, seven days. The
(46:35):
guy. I think the guys listenedto Happy Hour because every time food came
up, somebody a jab, youwant to go to Applebee's right right next
to the hotel. We were thereseven days, six nights. I did
not go Kim. I ate localevery night, with the exception of Saturday
(46:57):
night when I went to Morton's Steakhouseand UH and had the bar menu,
which was phenomenal. So everybody,thanks for joining us on Happy Hour this
season. We appreciate it. Fora lead broadcast producer Michael Goodrich and wrapping
up year number seven of Roadrunners Hockey, Kim coderrobos Grenferre, I'm Adrian Denny.
We'll talk to you on the Insiderpodcast all summer
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Special Summer Offer: Exclusively on Apple Podcasts, try our Dateline Premium subscription completely free for one month! With Dateline Premium, you get every episode ad-free plus exclusive bonus content.
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!