Patterson: Will Browne signing end cycle of frustration for Tips?

Published 6:00 pm Saturday, August 27, 2016

EVERETT — The biggest development of the offseason for the Everett Silvertips didn’t have anything to do with the big trade.

It didn’t involve captain Dawson Leedahl engineering his departure in the blockbuster deal that sent him to the Regina Pats.

It didn’t involve the rights to super-prospect Tyson Jost also heading to the Pats in the same deal, or the potential haul of first-round bantam draft picks the Tips would acquire should Jost decided to show up in Regina.

No, the biggest development involved a player who won’t even be eligible to play in the WHL this season.

The biggest development was the signing of Ethan Browne.

Browne was Everett’s first-round pick in this year’s bantam draft. The 15-year-old forward from Sherwood Park, Alberta, is the type of skilled playmaker every WHL team covets, the type who causes a team to whoop with joy when he’s still available at the 14th-overall pick.

But it wasn’t Browne’s selection in early May’s bantam draft that was the key moment for the Tips. That came when he signed a WHL education contract with the team in late June.

What his signing did was end a year’s worth of swings and misses by Everett with regards to skilled forwards.

That’s not to say the Tips haven’t landed forwards with offensive potential during that span. Connor Dewar signed prior to last season and is coming off a promising rookie season as a 16-year-old. Brett Kemp, the team’s second-round pick in 2015, signed on in February and is poised to join the team for the upcoming season.

However, the truly elite offensive talents, the ones who are talked about in NHL terms years ahead of being eligible for the NHL draft, have eluded the Tips.

When general manager Garry Davidson joined the organization in 2012, he arrived talking about creating an offensive team in Everett. To accomplish that his plan was to draft elite talent, even if those players weren’t committed to the WHL, then get to work recruiting those players.

It looked like it was all going to come together with Auston Matthews. Matthews, a third-round pick in Davidson’s first bantam draft in 2012, became one of the best junior players in the world while with the U.S. National Team Development Program. By all accounts the Tips had convinced Matthews to come to Everett following his two-year stint with the national team, and he was penciled in to lead the team offensively in 2015-16.

What the Tips didn’t count on, however, was Matthews becoming so good that a professional team in Switzerland would pay for his services, even though Matthews hadn’t even been drafted into the NHL yet.

The fact that Matthews, who went on to become the first-overall pick in this year’s NHL draft, proved too good for the WHL was just bad luck for the Tips. But what followed was a frustrating string of top-end offensive prospects turning Everett down in favor of the NCAA:

— Jost, the team’s first-round pick in the 2013 bantam draft, chose to play for the University of North Dakota rather than Everett.

— Patrick Khodorenko, selected a round after Jost, opted for Michigan State over the Tips.

— Nick Henry, perhaps the most skilled member of Everett’s draft class of 2014, picked Western Michigan — though he’s attending Regina’s training camp after having his rights shipped to the Pats in May.

— Ryan Savage and Carson Dimoff decided to go to Austria to further their development as players rather than pledge their futures to Everett. Savage eventually committed to Miami of Ohio, while Dimoff chose St. Lawrence.

Why did all these players spurn the Tips? Did Everett misread its ability to recruit players who always favored the NCAA route over the WHL route? Were the players influenced by the fact the Tips have never been considered an offensive juggernaut — Everett scored a Western Conference-low 182 goals last season, though Davidson is quick to point out the team scored a franchise-record 242 goals the year before — and were thus worried about their ability to develop offensively? Was head coach Kevin Constantine, who fairly or not has garnered a reputation as a defense-first coach, a factor?

Whatever one’s theory, the Tips hope Browne’s signing ends the cycle of frustration.

Browne is getting his first taste of Everett this week at the Tips’ training camp, and on Friday he expressed no concerns about being a offensive player signing with Everett.

“They wanted offensive guys with the next couple seasons coming up,” Browne said. “I think I fit that role pretty well.”

Indeed, Browne said he’s ready to be a part of the process as Everett builds its offense back up.

And just as importantly, his signing signals the Tips are back in the game with regards to landing elite offensive talent.

For more on the Seattle sports scene, check out Nick Patterson’s Seattle Sidelines blog at cmg-northwest2.go-vip.net/heraldnet/tag/seattle-sidelines, or follow him on Twitter at @NickHPatterson.