Pay No Attention to the Man Behind the Curtain

Sep 30, 2008

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Trevor Converse isn’t the Great Oz, he isn’t a snake oil salesman, or balloonist, and he’s not even from Kansas like the fictional Wizard of Oz.
 
He is the Director of Scouting and Player Personnel for an El Paso Rhinos program that has found victory 101 times in just 116 attempts in just 2 years.
 
He’s put together teams that have won Conference Championships, and qualified for the National Tournament each year and done so by recruiting players to a newly established program.
 
“Trevor’s ability to spot talent and be able to see if a kid will mesh within a team’s delicate structure of personalities has been probably the biggest reason for our success”  said El Paso Rhinos Head Coach Cory Herman.
 
Living with his wife Andrea, and their 2 children, Blake (5 ½), Emma (2 ½), and dog Aspen (13). Selling investment Real Estate in the greater San Antonio area, Trevor had settled into living the family life.
 
 
He played professional Hockey for years in several leagues and even went to camp with the NHL’s Edmonton Oilers.
He had been a coach in the NAHL, and WSHL, but had left that behind was now working full time on his career when the call came from Herman.
 
Both hailing from Saskatchewan, they were of the same philosophy and mindset when it came to the game of hockey.
 
Coach Herman knew he needed help recruiting coming into his rookie season as a head coach.
 
“Who better than Trevor to recruit for us?, he coached in the NAHL, and WSHL both, he has tons of contacts with NAHL, USHL, and NCAA teams and most importantly he’s a Saskatchewan boy”
 
Now for the curtain part…
 
Converse would continue to live in San Antonio and keep his job selling investment real estate, and Herman would send him on scouting trips, and from 600 miles away Trevor would handle all the scouting, and personnel moves for the team.
 
All this without attending a single practice, and being concealed by miles and miles of Texas.
 
It’s from behind this curtain, that Trevor Converse has been supplying Herman with the talent to build arguably the most celebrated new franchise in US Junior Hockey.
 
Hmmm?
 
Perhaps between them they are worthy of the apotheosis of Great Oz(s)?
 
Nah, too extravagant.
 
More likely they’re just a couple of Saskatchewan farm boys who just understand the game and how to farm the fertile US hockey landscape for talent, and harvest that bounty into success.
 
He is in Kansas now, Topeka Kansas, not a ScareCrow……a ROADRUNNER
 
Lucky for US.

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