Ron Kantowski recalls the year the very good Las Vegas Thunder went into their postseason games against the San Diego Gulls with too much confidence and were shocked to be taken out so early

Thursday, April 20, 2006 | 7:43 a.m.

That the Wranglers found themselves in a battle for their playoff lives Wednesday night against a supposedly inferior opponent might have come as a surprise to the team's Johnny-come-lately fans.

But it must have rekindled some bad memories for veteran Las Vegas puckheads, even ones not named Johnny.

It was the 1993-94 Las Vegas Thunder, an International Hockey League expansion franchise, that basically introduced the game to Southern Nevada with a style of play that ranged from artistry to mayhem - sometimes in the same night.

With its collection of former NHL veterans and future NHL stars, such as 17-year-old Radek Bonk, who would go on to become an NHL all-star, the Thunder made the rest of the IHL look like Dorothy Hamill, compiling a 52-18-11 record for a league-best 115 points.

Las Vegas drew the San Diego Gulls, a team they had drubbed by 20 points in the regular-season standings, in the first round of the Turner Cup playoffs.

The first game, on home ice at the Thomas & Mack Center, was closer than expected. But after a 3-2 victory, the Thunder players seemed more interested in talking about how they were going to look with beards and sideburns (as per a pro hockey tradition of not shaving during the playoffs) than how they were going to subdue a determined opponent.

The Thunder was eliminated before Ken Quinney, who led the team with 55 goals, was even sporting stubble. That entire season, Las Vegas had lost four games in a row just once. But the Gulls won the next four games played that week by scores of 7-4, 3-2, 6-4 and 2-1.

Instead of having their names engraved on the Turner Cup, the Thunder found them on the tee-time list at their local golf course. While I suppose that's not a terrible way to mark the end of a season, it certainly wasn't what the Thunder had in mind.

It has been 13 years since Bob Strumm, the Thunder general manager, began assembling the team that would go on to have a six-year love affair with Las Vegas hockey fans. But he remembers that playoff series with San Diego as if it were a high stick to the chin.

"I think we were just looking past it," said Strumm, now in his seventh season as director of pro scouting for the NHL's Columbus Blue Jackets. "Guys were already talking about their bonuses when we won it."

Sometimes, confidence is a good thing. This time, it wasn't.

And the real beauty - depending on what bench you're standing behind - is that the best team in the hockey playoffs doesn't always win.

Just ask all those guys named Ivan and Vladimir who skated for the 1980 Soviet Union.

"The intensity level of playoff hockey is second to none," Strumm said.

So, too, is the frustration level when not excelling at playoff hockey. While I had to go back into the Sun archives to check on how many games the Thunder won during that series, I will never forget how they lost the second one in San Diego.

First Las Vegas blew a two-goal lead. Then it blew a gasket. With 54 seconds remaining, the Thunder, with just a wee bit of help from the Gulls, turned decrepit San Diego Arena into a WWF cage match. Jim Kyte, the Thunder captain, deliberately kneed Hubie McDonough, the San Diego star, touching off a brawl that would have impressed Russell Crowe.

The teams were assessed 151 minutes in penalties. There were nine game misconducts, with six going to the Thunder. Clint Malarchuk, the Las Vegas goalie, was responsible for two of those. He also got two minutes for leaving his crease, two minutes for instigating a fight and five minutes for participating in one when he skated the length of the ice to punch out Gulls counterpart Allan Bester in a mismatch of former NHL netminders.

But the worst was yet to come. When the game ended, the Thunder's Marc Rodgers got into a shouting match with some boisterous fans behind the Las Vegas bench, which ended when Rodgers hurled his stick into the crowd, breaking the nose of a female fan.

Afterward, in a scene right out of the movie "Slapshot," San Diego police knocked on the door of the Thunder locker room, looking for Rodgers. By then, Strumm already had stashed him under some bags in the back of the equipment truck, where, I remember writing, he and the Hanson Brothers told old Federal League stories on the ride back to Las Vegas.

Ah, playoff hockey. You've gotta love it.

Or watch it at your own risk.