Scorps Have Some Big Shoes to Fill

The New Mexico Scorpions have treaded water as a successful team that has made the post-season in each of the last two seasons but have not made that jump to elite team status.  This season will be tough off the bat to jump to the next level as top players Konrad Reeder and Vladi Hartinger have headed elsewhere leaving very big voids.

Second year head coach Randy Murphy feels that those holes can be filled from some returning players and not by off-season acquisitions.  Craig Macdonald and Chris Robertson were both big parts of the Scorpions success. Macdonald scored 29 goals and Robertson notched 34 tallys.  They are joined by Mitch Stephens (17-24=41) as a top returning player.

In net, All-Star Andrew Martin returns after a great season that saw him go 19-12-2.  He will partner with Jason Wolfe who played with OKC last season going 14-17-3.

Jamie Herrington played with the Scorpions two seasons ago notching 25 points in 43 games.  He should add some good depth and scoring punch to the Scorpions line-up.

New Mexico is in a tough division with Arizona and Odessa and have several match-ups due to geography with Colorado and Rocky Mountain (the top teams in the NW Division) making the schedule a big obstacle. 

No matter how the Scorps start the season, they always seem to hit stride midway through and are always a team to watch out for.