Tag: Radoslaw Sawicki

Mens Hockey

The First Test for Kalaber Comes With Questionable Choices

1 year, 1 month, and 27 days ago, Robert Kalaber was named the head coach of the Polish national team. On August 26th, 2021, the Slovakian coach will coach his first IIHF game for team Poland. During that time, we have seen quite a few national team games. These games have all come against pretty weak competition or depleted rosters. The biggest challenges being Hungary and Latvia U23. It was thought his first test would be getting Poland back to the World Championship Group A. Instead, he will have to finish what Tomek Valtonen started with Poland’s path to the Olympics. 

This is the second time in a row that Poland has pulled off an upset in the third round of qualification and earned a shot at the final qualification round. In 2016, Poland lost three straight games as they were expected to. The final scores of those games were 6-1 Slovenia, 5-3 Belarus, and 5-2 Denmark. While not the greatest results. These games were all somewhat close, with Poland even holding the lead over Belarus. 

Poland once again is likely to lose all three games. Their opponents are going to be hard to break. You have team Austria that will be led by top NHL prospect Marco Rossi and a squad of players mostly playing back in Austria’s bet-at-home ICE Hockey League. Next up, you have a Belarus team that continues to improve, who will feature New Jersey Devils breakout star Yegor Sharangovich and an army of KHL talent. The final team and toughest opponent will be Slovakia, a roster featuring talent from all around the top leagues of Europe. 

These games’ goal will be to stay competitive, and who knows maybe they pull off a miracle upset in one of the games. So what is the strategy to do that? Do you go all out on the offensive end and try to outmatch them with firepower or at least fight fire with fire? Do you load up on the country’s best defenders and two-way forwards in the hope of establishing a strong defensive presence and capitalize on a few rare mistakes? 

There are plenty of ways to go, and it seems that Kalaber is taking the second route. When the Polish roster was announced there were three huge forwards missing. Damian Kapica (1st among Polish players in PPG), Radoslaw Sawicki (3rd in PPG), and Christian Mroczkowski (6th in PPG). The Polish squad later announced that Kapica would be missing due to a back injury, but what about two of Poland’s best goal scorers?

Kalaber talked to Hokej.net, saying, “Sawicki and Mroczkowski are offensive players who do better with the puck than without it. At this tournament, we must first and foremost defend ourselves effectively, because there will be players from the NHL and KHL in front of us.” He continued saying that “We are not building an offensive dream team, but the strongest team that will have to play under pressure with extremely demanding opponents. That is why I gave up Radek and Christian and selected forwards who are better in defense than in attack.”

While I can understand the idea that the team will need to be strong defensively, I also have a problem with the final result of the roster. At the end of the day, Poland’s best defensive forwards will not create any match-up nightmares. At the same time, a physical power forward like Christian Mroczkowski could definitely raise some hell. It is hard to argue whom spots you would take away to add the Canadian with a Polish passport or Sawicki to the roster. I do feel you can create strong arguments for Filip Starzyński, Kamil Walega, Mateusz Michalski, and Martin Przygodzki. 

The strongest for Filip Starzyński. Starzyński is a player I believe would be highly debated if analytics were more established in the PHL. He is commonly praised for being strong in the faceoff dot and best in his own zone, but the offense is almost non-existent. Over the past two years, his .30 PPG in 102 games ranks 52nd among all Polish forwards, 163rd among all skaters. 

There is so much talent that is being left on the board. I can’t justify some choices in the idea they make Poland that much better defensively or harder to play against. In the first true test for Kalaber, when his goal is to stay competitive, it is a choice to go in without two forwards considered among the best in Poland. These are the choices that will help define his era and staff. We will have to see how it plays out.

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Free Agent News

Radosław Sawicki Signs in Belarus

The departures from JKH GKS Jastrzebie continue, as the team has lost another one of their top Polish forwards. Radosław Sawicki has made the jump to go abroad signing with Shakhter Soligorsk in Belarus. This will be Sawicki’s second trip away from Poland in his career, after spending a junior season in the USPHL Elite.

Sawicki has long been considered a top young Polish forward, but only truly started to breakout in the past couple of years. After spending the early part of his career in Poland with GKS Katowice and KH Sanok, he moved over to JKH GKS Jastrzebie. In his two years with the team, he produced two above point-per-game seasons including 45 points (23-22-45) in 44 games in 2021. The 25-year-old also helped the green and white to their first PHL championship this season.

The 5’11 center in total recorded 177 points in 254 games with three clubs in Poland. On top of his one PHL championship, he also won a silver medal and and two bronze medals in the league. While I had my doubts about his 2020 season and how many points came up against weak teams. His 2021 season contained no such flaws. Its clear that the skilled center has high goals, as he told the Belarusian Extraleague A website, “In Jastrzęba I have achieved everything that can be achieved in Poland. I want to develop, so I must raise the bar for myself. I think Shakhtar and the Belarusian extraliga are very good places for this. I will come to a new country, a new culture and I will develop in hockey. Awesome! If I play as I expect, I will have a chance in the KHL – as part of Dynamo Minsk.“

Shakhter Soligorsk has been a force in the Belarusian Extraleague A since their arrival in 2010, the team has made 4 final appearances winning one championship. Last year the team finished second in the regulars season, eventually losing in the semi-finals. Sawicki will be the first Polish player in Shakhter Soligorsk’s history. The Sanok native will be the sixth Polish player overall to play in the top level of hockey in Belarus.

If you want to keep up with all the Polish hockey action, make sure to follow us on Twitter @PolandHockey, like our Facebook page, and add us on Instagram @PolishPuck_.

Mens Hockey

How Janow Single Handidly Inflated PHL Statistics

This year in the PHL, Naprzód Janów Katowice was beyond bad. The team was downright awful. They scored 49 goals in their 47 games while allowing 363 goals against, a differential of – 314. That is only 1.04 goals per game, and 7.7 goals against per game. Their 363 goals against were 188 more than Zagłębie Sosnowiec (175) who finished second to last in goals against. They went on to drop out of the league and are currently being investigated for missing funds. In the past few years, it seems like at least one PHL team has some kind of financial problems then leave before the year is over. Last year the PHL even had two of them, but Janow was much worse than both Polonia Bytom and Orlik Opole.

Najow

Janow was worse in every single category and almost doubled the 2018-19 lowlights in some categories. Playing against Janow was a free pass to run up the score. Janow allowed double-digit goals in twelve games. The worse being an 18-0 defeat to Podhale Nowy Targ.

One of the biggest success stories of a Polish player in the PHL this year was Radoslaw Sawicki. Sawicki was released by GKS Katowice earlier in the year and replaced by an import. JKH GKS Jastrzebie picked him up and he had a career year recording 45 points (22-23-45) overall in 45 games. His regular-season career-high was 26 points before this season. One of his biggest games this year was an 8 point showing against Janow, that JKH GKS Jastrzebie won 14-0. Sawicki played three games against Janow this year and recorded 10 points in those games. Janow made up 6.7% percent of his games, but 22.2% of his points. This isn’t to take anything away from the talented forward, but without his games against Janow, his regular-season point total returns to 31, and is more in line with his previous years of 26 and 25 points respectively.

Sawicki was not the only player that benefited from Janow. Krystian Dziubinski who finished fourth in the league in scoring posted 15 points against Janow or 25% of his 60 point total. While for a majority of players you will only see a couple points, that you could argue they would have scored against an average team. There are numerous examples where players were able to post almost a quarter of their points just from a couple blowout games vs. Janow.

While evaluating players statistically and trying to find growth, those games against Janow are important to consider. As a growth in points maybe a bit misleading as in the case of Sawicki. This came into play a lot when evaluating players for my top 80 U23 list, as in these games against Janow especially younger players were able to play more due to the game being as close to as guaranteed win as you can get. As such some promising years by young players appear not to be the case. Janow was so bad this year that some point totals in the PHL were inflated in just a handful of games.

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Free Agent News

Noureddine Bettahar Stays in the DEL2, Oskar Jaskiewicz Moves to Katowice. Weekly Offseason Update

This week in Polish hockey saw GKS Katowice take another former Podhale player, Cracovia invest in some young defensemen, and GKS Tychy getting a lot stronger, while outside the PHL Bettahar has found a DEL 2 club.

Noureddine Bettahar – One year deal with EC Kassel Huskies. Bettahar is going to be extending his stay in the German second league and with his fourth team in 4 years. Bettahar will be reuniting with Tim Kehler, one of his former coaches, in the team announcement of the signing Kehler said, “We are delighted to have signed Noureddine Bettahar for next season. I already know him from my time in Frankfurt in 2014. Noureddine is a young player who has not exhausted his full potential yet. He is a tall guy, but also runs well and also plays physically. I think that with the right environment and a given chance, Noureddine will be playing a strong season in Kassel.” (Translated via Google Translate) Bettahar was set to make his senior team Poland debut last year, til being concussed in a practice prior to the EIHC. This concussion ended up derailing his season as he missed a large chunk of the year and did not produce as well offensively when he returned to the line-up. He was not appointed to any other national team rosters. His national team status is once again up in the air.

Oskar Jaskiewicz – 2 year deal with GKS Katowice. National team defensemen Oskar Jaskiewicz has become the third national team player to switch to Katowice this offseason joining Mateusz Michalski and Patryk Wajda. The soon to be 23-year-old defensemen is one of Poland’s most promising young defensemen. It was rumored he was originally looking at offers in North America. He attributed part of the reason he signed in Katowice was Finnish coach Risto Dufva.

Radoslaw Sawicki – 2 year deal with GKS Katowice. GKS Katowice also extended the contract of Sawicki for 2 more years. The 23-year-old center had 25 points (7G, 18A) in 42 games last season.

Henrich Jabornik – 1 year deal JKH GKS Jastrzebie. The first new import in the PHL is here as Henrich Jabornik inked a one year deal with Jastrzebie. The 28-year-old represented Slovakia at the U18 and U20 IIHF World Championships in his junior career. He has spent in the last 3 years in the Erste Liga most recently with Dunaújvárosi Acélbikák. There he had 10 goals and 27 assists in 44 games.

Mike Cichy and Alex Szczechura to stay with GKS Tychy, and be joined by Jesse Rohtla. It appears that Mike Cichy and Alex Szczechura are close to new deals to stay in GKS Tychy as well is Jess Rohtla. Cichy and Szczechura have been two of the top scorers in the PHL since they arrived in 2014-15 and 2015-16. The two have played together every year since 2015-16. Rohtla arrived in the PHL in 2017-18 and lead the league in points with 53 (13G, 40). He returned to Poland this season and again played with GKS Katowice, where he had 44 points (22G, 22A) in 42 games. Now it appears the playmaking center is joining two of the other top scoring forwards in the PHL.

Patryk Gosztyla and Mateusz Bezwinski training with Cracovia Krakow. It appears Cracovia has invested in injecting some young defensemen in their line up next year. Gosztyla had played in the Slovak juniors system since 2015-16. The 19-year-old played last year for HK 32 Liptovsky Mikulas U20 and represented Poland at the U20 World Championship. Mateusz Bezwinski was a standout player at the U18s for Poland. The 17-year-old played mostly with SMS Torun last year, where he had 33 points (21G, 12A) in 22 games. He can move up and down the lineup.

Gdansk may have their goalie in Tomas Fucik. According to hokej.net, the 25-year-old netminder is close to a deal with Gdansk. Fucik previously played in Poland from 2016 to 2018 with JKH GKS Jastrzebie. He posted sv% above .930 in both his seasons where he played a total of 42 games. He spent most of last season in the Tipsort Liga with MsHK Zilina.

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