By Dan Marshall

Ex Clipper Irwin in the Stanley Cup Final, but Nanaimo’s junior coach also has connections

May 29, 2017 | 12:39 PM

NANAIMO — The Stanley Cup Final featuring the Pittsburgh Penguins and Nashville predators has some local connections.
 
The biggest is obviously former Clipper Matt Irwin who has been a fixture on the Predators blueline during the post season.
 
The Brentwood Bay product played three years in Nanaimo and won the 2007 Fred Page Cup while claiming Coastal Conference Best Defenseman awards in 2007 and 2008.
 
His former junior coach Bill Bestwick says he can remember back to Irwin’s first ever appearance in a Clipper uniform.
 
“We were over in Langley. He was a little bit nervous as a skinny, tall, lanky kid with skill. He had really good stick skills and a good IQ for the game,” said Bestwick.
 
At that time Irwin was an affiliate player out of the VIJHL’s Saanich Braves and he would eventually become the Clippers captain.
 
Bestwick says the now 29-year-old was undrafted and his experience playing college hockey at UMass Amherst was very valuable.
 
“College really changes kids at 19 or 20. They get there for a couple of years and they get into the strength regime program and it really develops these kids. Matt was a late developer and I think he started to realize how good he possibly could be,” Bestwick said.
 
Irwin was feared for his heavy shot during his time in Nanaimo and according to Bestwick that’s a part of his game that Matt spent a lot of time working on.
 
“Matt had a real skill for striking the puck,” Bestwick said. “I can remember sitting on a bucket with pucks in one hand just making him get his rhythm going, dropping pucks for him and letting him rip away.”

Current Clippers coach Mike Vandekamp has one of his former players suiting up in the Final as well.

Carter Rowney starred for Vandekamp in Grande Prairie in 2008-09.
 
Rowney then went on to play four years at the University of North Dakota, followed by four years in the minors in the ECHL and the AHL.
 
Vandekamp is still in contact with Rowney, and when it looked he was going to make his NHL debut with the Pittsburgh Penguins Vandekamp gave his ex-player some simple advice.
 
“Don’t let them send you down. Make it impossible,” said Vandekamp. “He’s been up since December and we’ve chatted off and on throughout that time. Even throughout the playoffs as recently as after the conference final game the other night we had had a quick text chat – it’s been fun to watch.”
 
There’s divided loyalties for Vandekamp though because of another connection he has to the Nashville organization.
 
Scott Ford played for him several years in Merritt in the late 90’s and Ford is one of the assistant coaches with the Predators farm team in Milwaukee.
 
Recent history has featured a couple of other Clipper alumni in the Cup Final, but only on the losing end.
 
In 2014 David Leneveu and the Rangers lost to the LA Kings, and in 2015 Jason Garrison and the Lightning fell to the Blackhawks.
 
If Matt Irwin and the Predators win in the Final this year he’ll be the only Clipper grad ever to play a significant role on a Stanley Cup championship team.
 
 
dan@nanaimonewsnow.com
 
On twitter: @danmarshall77