A Conversation with Boston Blades GM, Krista Patronick.
First Year General Manager of the Boston Blades, Krista Patronick. (Twitter)
At the end of the 2014-2015 season, the Boston Blades raised the Clarkson Cup as the Champions of the CWHL. One year later the team is 1-21-1 with just 4 returning players from the Championship season, a new General Manager and a new Head Coach.
I was able to chat recently with one of those new people, GM Krista Patronick, to discuss her rise to the GM position, the future of the Blades, and her work in promoting the Blades.
You were a volunteer for the Blades before you got the GM job, what were you doing as a volunteer and what made you think “I want to be the GM of this team?”
Hockey has always been my number one passion, I have my master’s degree in sports management and I was a journalist for a few years and decided that I want to pursue hockey as a career. It started as looking to get my foot in the door, but also I just have this passion for Women’s Hockey, I followed it for a while and obviously as a woman who plays hockey, I identified with the Blades, so I started volunteering for them, mostly doing stats during games, but also I was writing at the time too, so I was pretty familiar with the team that way, kind of how some operations stuff went and I was at the weekly staff meetings, so it was a natural thing when I saw that the job opening came, I thought I would throw my hat in the ring and see if there was any interest there, I work currently full time for the Hockey Academy as well so I have that experience too that I bring where I work for a couple of teams. So I just threw my hat in the ring and didn’t think anything would really happen, but I felt like I could do the job.
What was the timetable between your hiring and the migration of the players from the Blades to the NWHL?
I was hired in May, the players sent their release request in late August.
How did you come up with the team makeup after losing that many players off of the team’s previous year’s roster?
I took the approach that it takes a village to get a team. I had a lot of people helping me to put the word out that I was looking for players to play. Talking with people in my inner circle, whether that was professionally or contacts I’ve made through the Hockey Academy, when I was looking for a coach specifically. But also for players to put some feelers out there, I talked to Katie King over at BC who honestly helped me out a lot. I leaned on those people to talk to a lot of girls about the team.
What player or players have been the biggest surprise or best contributor this year?
Erin Kickham and Megan Shea. Kickham and to an extent Shea had these careers at BC where they rode the bench and for Kick to now be our leading scorer, it’s an amazing thing for her to have that experience, she was telling me a while back a story about how when BC was at the Frozen Four and she was just watching the game from the bench, so for her to be that go to person on the team says so much for the opportunity that we are able to offer to these girls and Megan Shea has been another go to girl and someone who just consistently shows up and works hard and has been a great example to the team.
Lacasse has been unbelievable for you this year. How do you keep her on the team, because she’s a definite need for the Blades.
Players have 1 or 2 year contracts, so when those contracts come up we have to talk with them about their plans and our plans and whether or not the team continues to be a good fit for them. Lacasse is up on her contract I believe, so we’re going to have to have that talk. It has to be a right fit for the player and the team, obviously we love her and have a need for her, we’d love to keep her around, but you know it has to be a two way thing and the player has to be happy here.
McCloskey is on the bench by himself, is that his choice, is that a money issue, are there any plans to give him support in running in game operations?
For now it’s more of a financial decision and how the contract was negotiated between us and him so that’s the only reason he’s alone, that’s not to say we couldn’t get a volunteer assistant coach, it’s just that everything came together so fast this season, so that didn’t happen. Brian is totally fine working alone, I think he gets the job done for sure.
Sources from the league office have said that there will be help for the Blades coming next season… can you give us any insights on some of those supports?
I don’t, even if I did, it’d probably be too early to say, but they’re definitely committed to Boston being a successful team in the CWHL, so I am confident that support is coming from Toronto.
The Blades have played at the Somerville Memorial Rink, the New England Sports Center and the Tsongas arena, are there plans in place to solidify one location as the place for the Blades?
Ya, I can’t speak too specifically on that just yet, but obviously some more consistent idea of a home we can get the better, easier for the players and easier for the fans as well, so that’s something we’re definitely looking at and moving towards, but it’s probably too early to get into that.
Being based out of the New England Sports Center, you’re out of Boston and some fans have said it’s too far to drive and it’s not easily accessible, have you tried to market more so to the Central Mass area, rather than Boston?
Ya, I think the whole thing about going out to NESC was to make it more accessible to everyone in the state. Maybe it’s not the city people who can’t get out there with public transportation, but to reach out to the communities in the Worcester area or the 495 belt. People come up to us and a lot of people do live in Suburbia and we say “We play at the NESC and they say oh great, I live in Hudson.” So it is closer for them, which we love. We did our best in terms of marketing to get people out to the games and reaching out to the youth teams in the area. Going forward we will continue to market, not just to Massachusetts, but to the whole New England area.
Have there been any discussion of renaming the team to distinguish the two “Boston” teams?
I can tell you the team won’t be renamed and we’re going through a rebranding process or at least we’re talking about that. Right now our logo is just a word mark, it’s not really a logo, so we’re working on that, but we won’t be renaming.
3 CWHL teams have NHL backing and I know last year there were some talks with the Bruins, are there any talks still going on with the Bruins or other local teams?
Yup, so we had 1 meeting with the Bruins and they put out a plan to support both Women’s teams. And so it’s not a financial backing but it’s more like social support. We’ve had a couple of nights at the Bruins games, where we’ve had our players go and do autographs. So support more in that sense that they’re offering to us, which is great and we’re definitely appreciative of it. So that’s been our relationship so far and hopefully it continues and any support with the NHL team in our back yard is great.
Commentary
I believe, with the support of the league office, that Krista Patronick will turn the Blades around. The recruitment of Boston area graduating seniors to play for the Blades needs to begin as soon as the season ends. There is plenty of talent playing hockey in New England to give the Blades a contender again. Similarly, Tara Watchorn and Genevieve Lacasse need to be resigned, these players are two great players to build a team around.
It is obvious that Krista worked hard to rebuild the Blades from scratch. She has marketed the Blades to a wide range of fans, not just in Boston, but to the larger New England area. She is already looking forward to strengthening the Blades team and fan base next season. Krista’s love of the game is evident, as is her passion to make the Blades a household name.
Follow Krista Patronick and the Boston Blades on Twitter (@BostonCWHL @KristaPatronick)
Also Follow Kyle Wescott on Twitter @MHSWescott
