MUSKEGON – You will occasionally find Steve Lowe at Muskegon Lumberjacks games, which shouldn’t be surprising, since he’s the team’s president of hockey operations.

But when he comes to town, it’s usually as a fan, and he brings his wife and two daughters with him,

“My girls have become super fans of the Lumberjacks,” he said. “They would rather go see the Jacks play on a Friday night than go to a school dance. They are really excited when we come to games.”

When it comes to hard hockey business, however, Lowe does most of his work from his home in Kalamazoo.

He and his family have lived there for years, and he has other business interests there that require his attention.

Besides, somebody has to be the guy who makes the tough personnel decisions for the Jacks, and Lowe finds that easier to do while observing from a distance.

Trading and releasing players can be tough in the United States Hockey League, particularly if you get to know them on a personal level.

They are talented but very young – between the ages of 17 and 20 – and it’s easy to become attached if you work with them every day.

Lowe doesn’t let that happen, because his job is to put the best possible team on the ice, and sometimes that means making unpopular decisions.

For instance, Lowe decided, early in the season, to release second-year goalie Jan Skorpik, who was very popular with his teammates but was not performing very well on the ice.

If a vote had been taken among the players and coaches, that move may never have happened. But Lowe doesn’t base his decisions on the feelings of others.

“Mike Hamilton (the Lumberjacks’ head coach) is very loyal to his players, and he wanted to give Jan an opportunity to start this season, but his stats at times last year weren’t great, and it became clear that he needed a change,” Lowe said.

To replace Skorpik, Lowe found two young Russian goalies – Platon Zadorozhnyy and Aleksandr Kuleshov – and worked through lots of red tape to bring them to town from their homeland.

Zadorozhnyy, in particular, was very good, and played a major role in helping the Jacks get past their slow start, go on a long hot streak and climb from last place to first in the USHL’S Eastern Conference.

“We knew who they were,” Lowe said about the Russian goalies. “It wasn’t like they just all of the sudden showed up. We had been trying to get them for about a month or a month and a half.”

The results of Lowe’s decisions are hard to argue with. He helped rebuild a bad Chicago Steel team and steer it into the playoffs for the first time. He took over a bad Tri-City Storm team and turned it into a Clark Cup champion.

With the Lumberjacks over the last few seasons, Lowe has given Coach Hamilton and his staff the talent to build a team that made it to the Eastern Conference finals in 2020-21, and is contending for a conference championship, and maybe more, this season.

He’s done all of that while operating from Kalamazoo.  He’s living proof that on-site management is not always necessary.

That may not be a recipe for success for other executives in the hockey world, but it certainly works for Lowe.

“I watch every single game (via live streaming),” Lowe told MuskegonSports.com. “I like to keep a low profile and do my job. I don’t need the glitz and glamour.

“I don’t get emotionally involved, which is a good thing, because the coaches do. I get practice film sent to me every single day, and I watch the majority of it. I let my people who are in place in Muskegon do their jobs, and I give them the flexibility to be independent in their jobs, but I also have some hard principles that they understand.”

A record of winning remotely

Lowe grew up in Kitchener, Ontario, worked his way up to the high levels of junior hockey and was drafted by the National Hockey League’s Dallas Stars, but his playing career peaked when he reached the East Coast Hockey League.

He coached youth hockey for a time after his playing days ended and was uncertain about his future. He was a friend of the general manager/coach of the Chicago Steel and did a bit of scouting for the team. He made a few recommendations to them one year about players they should grab in the USHL draft, the Steel bosses followed his advice, and it turned out to be good.

As a result, Lowe was hired to be the director of scouting for the Steel in 2008, and helped build a team that qualified for the playoffs for the first time in franchise history.

Lowe moved on from the Steel after two seasons, then was contacted by Kirk Brooks, the owner of the Tri-City Storm, a team that makes its home in distant Kearney, Nebraska.

Lowe became president of hockey operations with the Storm in 2010, and began managing a team that played four states away from Kalamazoo.

The first four seasons were rough, but the Storm started winning in 2014-15 when they finished second in the Western Conference. In 2015-16 they hit the jackpot, taking first place in the conference and winning the Clark Cup, which goes to the USHL’s playoff champion.

The two seasons after that involved some more rebuilding, but in 2018-19 the Storm won the Western Conference title again, along with the Anderson Cup, which goes to the team with the best regular season record in the league.

“I was reluctant to take that job, because I had a young family, but Kirk Brooks asked me the total amount I paid for my mortgage and day care, and that’s what he offered me as a salary,” Lowe said. “I worked extremely hard for that man. He took care of my family.

“They went from being the Bad News Bears to what they are today. We won the Anderson Cup and Clark Cup, and I believe Tri-City has led the league in having players selected in the NHL draft over the last 10 years.”

Brooks eventually sold the team and Lowe started making plans to move on.

Interestingly, Lowe brought in a new general manager and assistant general manager before he left the Storm, because he respected the franchise and wanted to leave it in the best possible hands.

A quick look at the standings tells us he did just that. Tri-City won the USHL’s Western Conference title last season and has the best record in the entire league this season.

“I knew those guys would keep the ball rolling,” Lowe said. “I’m proud of what they are doing without me.”

Lowe joined the Lumberjacks as president of hockey operations early in the 2019-20 season. He was hired along with Jimmy McGroarty, the Jacks’ general manager, who works closely with Lowe on scouting and personnel decisions.

Lowe was clearly coveted by Lumberjacks owners Dan Israel and Bob Kaiser, who parted ways with a pretty successful general manager, Ryan Bennett, to make room for Lowe to run the team.

“I was not unhappy with Ryan or the product on the ice,” Israel said at the time. “We just had an opportunity to secure the best guy in the league (Lowe) and an opportunity to get better.”

Bringing great players to Muskegon

Within days of joining the Jacks, Lowe completed a big trade with the Omaha Lancers, acquiring talented forwards Rhett Pitlick and Cameron Berg, as well as the rights to defenseman Tyler Dunbar.

Pitlick was the big name in that trade, but Berg turned out to be a real steal, totaling 27 goals and 31 assists last season and helping the Jacks finish second in the USHL’s Eastern Conference.

Dunbar is a rock-solid defenseman for the Lumberjacks this season and has contributed offensively with 10 assists.

Pitlick was not happy with his playing time in Muskegon and asked to be traded early last season. Lowe accommodated him by sending him to Tri-City for Nick Portz, a hard-working forward who totaled 10 goals and 17 assists with the Jacks in 2020-21.

“We win by developing players and playing four lines.” Lowe said. “Some like it and some want more ice time that we can’t give them. We knew what kind of person Portz was, and his competitive nature, and we knew he would be successful here.”

Lowe has made a lot of other successful moves since taking over the Jacks,

He worked with McGroarty to bring forward Quinn Hutson to Muskegon in the middle of last season, after Hutson’s team in the British Columbia Hockey League stopped playing due to COVID.

Hutson currently leads the Jacks in scoring, and is fifth in the league, with 26 goals and 31 assists.

Lowe convinced Phil Tresca to come to Muskegon last season when he had VISA problems and couldn’t get into Canada to play in the British Columbia league.

Tresca is the Jacks’ second-leading scorer this season, and 13^th in the league, with 25 goals and 21 assists.

He selected Joey Larson in the league’s Phase 2 draft last spring, after Larson was released by the Des Moines Buccaneers last season.

Larson is the Jacks’ third-leading scorer this season, and 15^th in the league, with 23 goals and 21 assists.

Lowe selected forward Ben Strinden in the USHL draft. He’s currently the Jacks’ fourth-leading scorer, and 18^th in the league, with 21 goals and 23 assists.

This season Lowe got busy after the team’s slow start, trading second-year forward Tom Sinclair to Fargo for forward Jake Braccini, which has turned out to be another steal. Sinclair had a season-ending injury with Fargo after seven games, while Braccini has been a major force for the Jacks this season, with 18 goals and 12 assists.

Lowe’s most recent move was to acquire goaltender Chase Clark, after Zadorozhnyy was recently lost for the season due to lingering symptoms from COVID. Clark is a draft pick of the Washington Capitals, and the Jacks are hoping he will help solidify the goaltending situation heading into the playoffs.

“We pride ourselves on keeping a book on the kids,” Lowe said. “For instance, we knew who Braccini was, and we knew if he got into Coach Hamilton’s offensive system, there would be a good chance of a good outcome.”

‘I believe in this group’

Lowe believes in building a roster from the back of the ice forward, starting with strong goaltending and defense.

He also believes in stockpiling quality forwards and playing four offensive lines on a nightly basis. That may cost some players some ice time, but it allows a team to wear opponents down.

This season’s Lumberjacks mirror his philosophy, particularly up front. A lot of forwards see a lot of ice time, and they have clearly developed.

The Jacks have seven forwards with at least 10 goals this season, and 10 forwards with at least 10 assists.

As Coach Hamilton likes to say, when playing 5-on-5, the Lumberjacks can compete successfully with any team in the league because of their depth.

“I don’t believe in having a fourth line or first line,” Lowe said. “I believe in having 12 forwards who can play in any given situation. That drives competition throughout the lineup.”

This Jacks got off to a slow start this season, winning only 2 of their first 12 games. Then they caught fire toward the middle of November, winning 17 of 20 games and climbing from last place to the top of the standings.

The Jacks are currently in third place in the Eastern Conference, just three points behind second-place Dubuque and six behind first-place Chicago.

Lowe said he never lost faith in the roster he assembled, and was convinced that the situation would quickly improve.

“I went to the players and coaches and had a meeting with them,” Lowe said. “I told them to relax, and that I believed in this group. We just weren’t having the bounces go our way for a while. We needed to make a goaltending change, it turned out to be the right move, and we’ve gone forward since then.”

The Jacks have hit another slump in the last few weeks, winning only four of their last nine games. But Lowe said he still believes in the roster and is convinced the team will bounce back and be successful through the stretch run of the season.

“I think this is a great opportunity for growth in our team,” he said. “This is a good opportunity for a reset, and I think we will be much better in the playoffs because of it. Failure teaches people how to get better.”

Lowe said he sees a lot of similarities between this year’s Lumberjacks and his Tri-City squad that won the Clark Cup in 2015-16, and he believes the Jacks could have similar success.

“That 2015-16 team started slow, but we believed in the players,” he said. “It was the same thing. I think we were in fifth place going into Christmas, then we got on a roll and went to first place. The similarities are very real. I think we absolutely have a chance this year.”