Sea Dogs make scouting changes

Michael Hawkins/Saint John Sea Dogs

The Saint John Sea Dogs announced additions to their scouting department on Monday.

The moves come a few weeks after the Sea Dogs fired general manager Anthony Stella and gave the GM role to head coach Travis Crickard.

With Crickard doing both roles, the head scout position becomes much more pivotal to Saint John's hockey operations. That role will be filled by Nicolas Lepore, who has been a scout with the Quebec Remparts since 2015. Saint John's news release notes that "Lepore is also the owner and president of Triple Threat Hockey and the Hockey Program Director at Des Sources High School."

Lepore is just one of several additions to Saint John's scouting department. Below is a breakdown of how the team's scouting staff now looks.

• Head Scout — Nicolas Lapore
• Senior Advisor to the Head Scout & Quebec Regional Scout — Marc-Andre Roussel 
• Hockey Operations Assistant & Quebec Regional Scout — Chris Hatzitolios 
• Scouting Advisor — Wayne Mundey 
• Atlantic Canada Regional Scout — Rob Beatty 
• Atlantic Canada Regional Scout — Tim Smith 
• Quebec Regional Scout — Sean Mundey 
• Quebec Regional Scout & Prospect Development — Tim Archambault 
• United States Scout — Bob Beveridge 
• Ontario Scout — Tyler Brown

Roussel was a scout with the Sea Dogs from 2011 to 2014 before he joined the Remparts. He was part of the group that drafted the likes of Thomas Chabot, Matthew Highmore and Mathieu Joseph.

The Sea Dogs website has a more detailed look at the entire staff – which is much larger than what the team has had in recent seasons.

“Assuming the general manager position I felt it was necessary to be surrounded by a highly experienced and connected scouting staff,” said Crickard in a news release.

“Rob, Tim, Tyler, Sean, Wayne, Bob, Chris, and Tim are incredibly humble team first people who come with extensive experiences and connections,” Crickard added. “It is a tremendous honour to add these gentlemen to our organization to work toward building another championship Sea Dogs team.”

The first challenge for the new group will be preparing for December's QMJHL trade period, which will help shape Saint John's 2025 draft weekend. It's also going to be a much different world by week's end, with the NCAA likely to vote yes on allowing CHL players into the league as early as next season.

The Sea Dogs also confirmed that Marc-Olivier Heredia, Trevor Scott and Normand Poisson have been let go from the team's staff.