By Nathan Kanter

Physicality, positivity the keys for Manegre

Dec 12, 2016 | 4:25 PM

North Stars defenceman (and sometimes forward) Connor Manegre is a local product. He was born in North Battleford, grew up in Meota, played his minor hockey for the Midwest Red Wings in Turtleford, and played parts of two seasons for the AAA Stars.

But after the 2014-15 season, he found himself playing junior B hockey in Grand Forks, B.C., far away from family and friends. That was because the Melfort Mustangs weren’t keen on keeping too many rookies. After Manegre signed with them, he didn’t dress in a single game.

So off to B.C. he went.

Quickly, he refocused and made the most of it, knowing he wanted to return to Saskatchewan and be ready for the next level.

“That’s kind of where I happened to get into the gym – after being cut from Melfort I realized I had to do something,” Manegre said after North Stars practice on Monday. “I wanted to take what I’m good at and that’s obviously being physical and the only way you can be successful at being physical is if you’re strong. So in B.C., I was at the gym pretty much every day, even on game days.”

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That rigorous work ethic continued this past summer and into training camp, where he returned to the Battlefords and made the North Stars.

This season, it’s impossible to miss number 22 out there bowling his way over opponent after opponent, making the most of every shift.

“Throughout the summer I did what I was good at… and I got my cardio up. I was running hills a lot, pretty much four or five times a week – running Don Ross hill,” he said. “Just had a mentality that I wanted to come into this team and do what I do best and that is bring my physicality to the game.”

Manegre knows he wasn’t brought in for his prolific goal scoring talents.

In B.C. with Grand Forks, he had no goals in 32 games. With the AAA Stars in a season and a half, no regular season goals, although he did notch a playoff marker.

And just recently with the North Stars, he notched his first career junior A goal, in his 27th game of the season.

“Obviously, I’m not a guy with a lot of skill. You want see me pulling toe drags and scoring on all the chances I get,” he said. “I was here when Battlefords lost out to Flin Flon last year and honestly, not just myself, but other people were saying…they were missing the key physicality. They had a lot of skill but not much grit so that’s kind of what [head coach] Nate [Bedford] is basing his game off of so that’s prefect for me. I’ve just got to stick to it and keep doing what I’m good at and that’s cranking guys.”

That being said, there’s nothing quite like scoring a goal, and when it does happen, as it did on Saturday against Kindersley for the first time, it creates an unforgettable moment.

Despite it being the sixth goal of a lopsided score in the final minute of play, the entire North Stars bench went nuts.

“It was a big scramble in front, I saw… the puck – saw that empty net – and honestly I just kind of blanked out after that,” Manegre said. “It was such an exciting moment for myself. I ended up kind of throwing it in there. Honestly I don’t even know how it went in but all the boys went crazy. They were loving it. I was definitely loving it. It was definitely a moment to remember for my hockey career.”

Other than his relentless work ethic, the other thing that stands out about Manegre is his positivity.

Head coach Nate Bedford notices it too, and said it’s important to have guys like that on your team.

“When we go through spurts when things aren’t quite going our way, we need guys like [Manegre] that will step up and kind of right the ship a little bit,” Bedford said. “Guys love having you on their team because you know a guy like that is going to have their back all the time. I think that’s the thing he brings out in himself with that positive energy.”

“I like to play with a lot of heart,” Manegre said. “Always have a positive mentality because that’s what hockey is all about. If you come off and have a bad shift, you can look down on yourself or you can just get right back up and go back into it.

“Negative will get you nowhere.”

The long-term goal for Manegre, like many others, is to get a scholarship to play at college, whether that’s in the States or up here in Canada.

“Everybody wants that scholarship, wants their schooling paid for,” he said. “Any time you can continue your hockey career, that’d just be awesome because you’re playing the best game, so you never want to quit.”

Nathan Kanter is battlefordsNOW’s sports reporter and voice of the Battlefords North Stars. He can be reached at Nathan.kanter@jpbg.ca or tweet him @NathanKanter11