Snakes return four defenders for 2016-17 season
The Columbus Cottonmouths continued with the mantra of building from the net out with their newest batch of signings.
The Snakes returned a foursome of defensemen — Rusty Hafner, Alex Pompeo, Kyle Shapiro, and Kyle Johnson — the latter of whom returns to Columbus to reprise his role as captain of the team.
“It’s important to start out from the back end,” said Cottonmouths head coach Jerome Bechard. “With (Brandon) Jaeger and (Alex) Larson (at goaltender), that’s a good start, and then bringing back four guys who know each other and how I want to play.”
Shapiro led all Columbus defensemen last season with 18 points off eight goals and 10 assists. The 6-foot, 205-pound blueliner spent his first full pro season with the Snakes after a brief 11-game stint with then-ECHL Evansville in the 2014-15 season. He had a successful four-year collegiate career at Nichols College, tallying an even 60 points (18 goals, 42 assists) in 108 games. He will be reunited with a former Nichols teammate at camp this season as Larson was a goaltender for the team as well.
Pompeo joined the Snakes for the final ten games of the regular season last year, his first professional stint. At 6-foot-1, 190 pounds, he played four seasons of college hockey with Southern Maine and Salve Regina, picking up 26 goals and 49 assists in 103 total games. He notched six points with the Cottonmouths, scoring four of those in the final five games of the season.
Hafner also was a first-year pro with the Cottonmouths last season after four years at Bowling Green, tallying two goals and 14 assists in 76 total games. He notched 14 points in 51 games played with Colunbus last season off two goals and 12 assists.
While Hafner will report straight to Columbus in October for training camp, Pompeo and Shapiro will be heading to ECHL training camps to begin the 2016-17 campaign. Pompeo will be nearby in Charleston, S.C., with the South Carolina Stingrays’ training camp, while Shapiro will be with the Indy Fuel to start the season.
Bechard will be looking for more offense out of the defensemen to jump-start an offense that scored an SPHL record-low 124 goals in all last season.
“They can all help out offensively,” Bechard said. “Pomps and Shapiro are puck moving defensemen, and they’ll have to chip in on the physical style as well.”
Johnson returns for his fifth season as a Snake and his fourth as captain of the team. He had a career-high 12 points last season with two goals and 10 assists. At 6-foot-3, 200 pounds, Bechard is looking to Johnson this season to have more of a physical role with the team, something he himself brought to the table as captain of the Cottonmouths in the CHL and ECHL from 1996 to 2003.
“This season, I need (Johnson) to play with a passion,” Bechard said. “When we need a spark, he needs to lead us — give a big hit, get in a scrap, play with an edge. That’s what I need out of him this year. We’ll lean heavily on him.”
The Cottonmouths and the SPHL begin training camp roughly two months from now in preparation for the 2016-17 season. The Snakes will host Pensacola in an exhibition game on Saturday, Oct. 15 at the Columbus Ice Rink prior to opening the season schedule the following week with a home-and-home series against the intrastate rival Macon Mayhem. The two teams will play at the Macon Coliseum on Friday, Oct. 21, with the scene shifting to the Columbus Civic Center for the home opener on Saturday, Oct. 22.
“At the end of the day, it starts with me,” Bechard said of the upcoming season. “I’m going to have to crack the whip on guys, make sure everyone’s on the same page. There’s one way to do things, and that’s hard, physical, and play the way we play.”
This story was originally published August 9, 2016 at 9:48 PM with the headline "Snakes return four defenders for 2016-17 season."