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“Loved it, can’t wait to coach someday, but every mentor or coach I ever had said, ‘If you’ve got an opportunity to play, you’ve got to take that, no matter what.’ So it was a no-brainer for me to come up. I’m thankful to be here, for sure.”

The irony isn’t lost on Kilgore that the winding path that took him from Bakersfield to the big leagues in Edmonton is one well-travelled in the hockey realm.

“The Condors did pretty well this year, too,” he said. “We went to a couple of games. It’s awesome to have them there, and I don’t think I put those two together until I got down to Florida for mini-camp.

“Usually when you say Bakersfield, you have to say a couple of hours north of L.A. It’s not my hometown, but it’s where my wife’s from.”

And the Condors making a deep playoff run could certainly bode well for the Oilers in the coming years.

“Absolutely,” Kilgore said. “Can’t wait. I’d love to be here for it.”

And it certainly won’t hurt having a coaching-minded teammate for Trevor Harris, who is being brought in to fill the well-worn cleats of Mike Reilly.

“That year of experience has transformed myself out here, especially as a support member or whatever my role is going to be,” Kilgore said. “But absolutely, if I see something. Trev has such a good understanding of the offence. He’s going to be a great coach as well someday. So typically if I’m coaching somebody up, it’s just taking one thing off his plate.

“It’s not something where I’m second-guessing or anything like that. It’s really just I want to be an extension of whatever he needs, and we’re extensions of what coach (Jason Maas) and Jordan (Maksymic, offensive coordinator) need.”

Sweet 15

Kilgore is the first Eskimos quarterback to be given the No. 15 since Ricky Ray was last the face of the franchise in 2011.

“I’m thankful for having Ricky’s number, for sure,” joked Kilgore, who previously wore the No. 10 when he was teammates with Ray in Toronto. “I texted him right when I got here and told him thanks for calling Dwayne (Mandrusiak, Eskimos equipment manager) and telling him to give me his number.

“Of course, he responded: ‘Oh, man. They just give that number to anyone nowadays.”

Email: gmoddejonge@postmedia.com

On Twitter: @GerryModdejonge