Royal Knights down but not out

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This article was published 09/11/2018 (2534 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

It’s been a lean couple years for the River East Royal Knights, but the team is taking it game by game and looking to build a solid foundation for a successful future.

“Things are dreary looking, but I haven’t given up hope,” Barry Bonni, Royal Knights general manager, told The Herald. “We’re still in a rebuild position. Those things take time. We have a lot of high school kids, now they’re 18 and playing against 20, 21-year-olds. When they mature, the game will slow down for them.”

Last season, after missing the playoffs for two years in a row, Bonni decided to “blow the team up” and start fresh with a roster full of rookies. The Royal Knights finished the 2017-18 season in last place in the 10-team Manitoba Major Junior Hockey League with a dismal 2-41-2 record, missing the playoffs for the third straight season.

“My mandate wasn’t to win immediately but to rebuild the team,” he said.

Bonni started the 2018-19 season behind the bench, but the Royal Knights are struggling yet again. 

“The depth isn’t there,” Bonni admitted. “We’d battle right to the end, but we would find ways to lose games as opposed to win.”

After going winless in their first five games, Bonni stepped aside as coach, handing the reins over to his son, Blake. At press time, the Knights had lost another five but had managed one point from an overtime loss to the St. Vital Victorias on Oct. 21.

“We don’t look good in the standings. But in this situation we’re not focused on the results but on the process, getting into the details of the game,” the younger Bonni said. “And, first and foremost, there is a good dressing room, a good group of guys here.”

Most of this year’s Royal Knights squad is made up of second-year players, with rookies filling the bulk of the ranks. 

“We play pretty hard-hitting and can dictate a physical game, and that’s been a pleasant surprise,” Blake explained. “Part of that process is taking it shift in, shift out, regardless of the score, with something on the line, whether that’s the game or pride.”

For Barry Bonni, now in his 37th year at the helm of the Royal Knights organization, the longevity of the program is paramount.

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“That’s the ultimate goal, to provide a means of giving kids in River East a chance to play junior,” Bonni, who was inducted into the Manitoba Hockey Hall of Fame last year as a builder, said. Since the club’s founding in 1981, Bonni and the Royal Knights have won seven league championships, including four in a row between 1986-87 and 1989-90, and most recently in 2000-01.

Blake, 35, played two years with the Royal Knights in his youth, and another three years of junior A with the Winnipeg Blues and the Selkirk Steelers. He has been involved as an assistant coach with the Royal Knights for years now. He agreed with his father that building a solid foundation for the Royal Knights future success is key.

“We want to create a solid structure, and from there we want to build off that,” he said. “Right now, we do see things that each guy can bring and contribute to the team, and we just hope to build off that. If they can fill in their roles, that usually makes up a good team.”

The younger Bonni is joined behind the bench by assistant coaches Steven Crampton, who played four seasons with the Moose Jaw Warriors in the Western Hockey League before embarking on a 10-year professional career in the ECHL, AHL, and in Europe, and Tom Boomer, another former Royal Knight.

“Make no mistake, we want to have a successful team on the ice, but there are other factors that make the program a success,” Blake Bonni said. “We’re going to be supportive, positive, yet hold everyone accountable. That goes throughout the program, coaches or players, everyone’s accountable and we’re going to support each other through thick and thin. We want to continue that.”

Sheldon Birnie
Community Journalist

Sheldon Birnie is a reporter/photographer for the Free Press Community Review. The author of Missing Like Teeth: An Oral History of Winnipeg Underground Rock (1990-2001), his writing has appeared in journals and online platforms across Canada, the U.S. and the U.K. A husband and father of two young children, Sheldon enjoys playing guitar and rec hockey when he can find the time. Email him at sheldon.birnie@freepress.mb.ca Call him at 204-697-7112

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