While Captain Cody has a nice ring to it, Cody Alcock never imagined such a happening when he came to his first Kingston Frontenacs camp in September.

Alcock, 19, was named the 36th captain in franchise history after the Ontario Hockey League trade dust settled and Tyler Brown had been sent to the Sarnia Sting earlier this month.

"Certainly it's a little bit of a surprise and I'm happy about it," said Alcock, whose team returns to action on Friday night against the Kitchener Rangers at the K-Rock Centre.

"I was playing Tier II (junior A in Whitby) last year and wasn't expecting to come back to the (OHL).

"At the beginning of the year I told myself I wanted to be a leader because I know what it's like to be in a league as a younger player. So I tried to set myself as a leader right from the beginning."

Alcock, who had 101 games of OHL experience in the lineups of the Belleville Bulls and the Oshawa Generals, has put up decent numbers for the Frontenacs. He has 15 goals and with 29 points, is second behind Odessa's Darcy Greenaway (31 points) in team scoring.

Alcock said he has told coach Todd Gill he is quite willing to return to the Frontenacs next season as an overage player.

"We want him back. We looked at that too (when Alcock was named captain)," Gill said.

"With so many young guys, we decided (Alcock) was a logical choice and he's been a good choice for us."

Gill said Alcock, much like Brown, is not a vocal leader but rather lets his play show the way for others.

"He's come a long way from training camp to now. He's a kid that works at it, battles hard, has been one of our better players and seems to be getting better each game," Gill said.

"We decided that's the type of leadership we wanted in that room."

Alcock was made the captain of his hometown Whitby Fury about a month after he joined the Ontario Junior Hockey League team. He considers it an honour to wear the 'C' for a team, although he admits he was a bit superstitious too.

"When it happened in Whitby I went a couple games without scoring. I didn't know if it was like a little curse or what not," Alcock said.

"I didn't know if it would happen here too. Luckily, I scored my first game (as captain against the Barrie Colts). No curse."

The early highlight of his captaincy was the Frontenacs' 4-1 victory over the Canadian Hockey League's No. 2 ranked London Knights last Friday in front of a crowd of more than 9,000 at the John Labatt Centre.

"To do that against one of the favourites in our league certainly felt good, especially with our young group of kids," Alcock said.

Like everyone around the team, Alcock is excited about the young talent Kingston acquired prior to the trade deadline.

Alcock has played on the left wing with Ryan Kujawinski, the 16-year-old acquired from Sarnia for Ryan Spooner.

"He's a great kid off the ice first off. On the ice he's big, has good speed and his hockey sense is there," Alcock said.

"He'll have a bright future."

At practices this week, Billy Jenkins, 17, is in the middle for Alcock and Petr Beranek.

"(Jenkins is) another (young guy) who is playing well too, putting up numbers. He's quick, good on draws and good defensively," Alcock said.

"There's two pretty good centremen (for Alcock to be with)," Gill said.

"The future is bright for this team. If you look at the talent that we brought in, 16 and 17-year-olds who didn't play a lot," he said.

"Kujo (Kujawinski) is producing every game. Jenks (Jenkins) is producing every game. In Kitchener, (Jack) Nevins was prepared to jump in with one of the biggest (six-foot-six, 242-pound defenceman Cody Sol, 20) in the league to protect his teammate."

There are other young players Gill sees good signs in too — forwards Adam Lloyd, Jacob Smith, Jean Dupuy and defencemen Warren Steele and Ryan Hutchinson. That has the coach upbeat about what lies ahead.

"In this rebuilding stage, I'm not looking at wins and losses. I can't. It just doesn't make sense," Gill said.

"I'm looking at five on five (even-strength hockey). Are we capable of competing? What do we have to do on the speciality teams to get better?

"What do I got to do to make one individual better so it makes the line better? That's kind of how I'm approaching it."

FRONTENACS NOTES

At Wednesday's practice, it was a full house with 14 forwards and seven defencemen on hand. Defenceman Alex Gudbranson is halfway through a 10-game suspension. Conor Stokes is eligible to return from his 10-game suspension on Saturday when the Frontenacs play in Oshawa.