In junior hockey, almost everyone ends their season on a losing note. Only one team out of 22 gets to send a championship banner to the rafters when a season ends. But that doesn’t mean the season is a failure for the remaining 21 teams.
That’s part of the mental balancing act that must take place in the mind of most general managers when the campaign is concluded, and Wheat Kings head coach and GM Marty Murray is no exception. The team bowed out sooner than they’d have liked in 2024-25, but grew immensely and overcame an almost unbelievable amount of injury-related adversity along the way.
“There were lots of ups and downs, that’s for sure,” Murray said. “In the regular season, I thought we held our own really well. Unfortunately, we were up against a lot of injury trouble throughout the year consistently and it was tough for the guys to get some chemistry with linemates, but overall I thought they handled that adversity really well.”
The biggest “what if?” from the season has to come from the East Division race, which the Wheat Kings lost by a single point. A team might gain or lose a single point countless times throughout a season, especially when faced with so many injuries, and that single point was the difference between facing the Edmonton Oil Kings in round one and facing the Lethbridge Hurricanes. The Wheat Kings dropped a five-game series against Lethbridge, while the Prince Albert Raiders (the eventual division winner) beat the Oil Kings in seven games.
“It’s a little bit of a stinger that we lost the division by one point,” Murray said. “You look back at some of the games where we probably gave away points, it makes it sting that much more. But that’s hockey. We went up against a tough opponent in Lethbridge in the first round, we knew that they were going to be good, they had 14 19-and-20-year-olds… In the series we played hard, even if you asked Lethbridge it didn’t feel like a 4-1 series but it was. I thought we deserved a little better than losing in five games.”
As painful as the injury trouble was during the season, even that carried with it some benefits. Young players found themselves thrust into elevated roles far sooner than normal, and to the delight of Murray and his coaching staff they took to those roles immediately.
“You look at guys like (Giorgos) Pantelas, playing against the other team’s top guys every night, you’re talking about NHL first round picks and he held his own every time he was out there,” Murray said. “(Jaxon) Jacobson had some tough matchups and did well. (Brady) Turko came into the playoffs, played head-to-head against (Brayden) Yager’s line and did a good job. The list goes on and on with our young guys gaining valuable experience. Hopefully that pays dividends next year.”
Gio Pantelas is one of four rookies on the Wheat Kings’ blue line that’s helped steer them through a crazy stretch of injuries. (Photo by Scramble Studio)
Especially promising for the future was the play of this season’s class of 16-year-olds. By the end of the season, the Wheat Kings had five of them in the lineup: Jacobson, Pantelas, Nigel Boehm, Isaac Davies, and Cameron Allard. Jacobson, Pantelas, and Boehm played the entire season in Brandon.
“Jacobson, he was top-ten in our team scoring and .8 points per game, that’s pretty good for a 16-year-old,” said Murray. “Pantelas played against other team’s top lines, especially in the second half of the year and really excelled. Boehm was a steady Eddie all year, we know what we’re getting out of him, he’s a defense-first player and he did a really good job eating up a lot of minutes.”
The immediate future, however, rests with the 2006-born players on the Wheat Kings. Caleb Hadland finished second on the team in goals and brought a heavy, hard-working game every night. Jordan Gavin, acquired in trade from the Tri-City Americans, finished tied for third in team scoring and showed remarkable puck smarts. And that’s not mentioning Roger McQueen, who would almost certainly have led the team in scoring had he been healthy. Overall, there are eight players from the 2006 class on the roster.
“A healthy McQueen will be critical,” Murray said. “It’s something we’ve, unfortunately, dealt with for over a year so hopefully we can get some answers, get him healthy, and get him in the lineup every night. He tried, but it was hard for him to get into a rhythm.”
McQueen is a probable first-round pick in the coming NHL entry draft, and he’s likely to have company. McQueen, Gavin, Carter Klippenstein, Joby Baumuller, and Brady Turko are all first-time eligible players who’ve earned interest from NHL scouts throughout the season. The NHL draft will take place on June 27 and 28, and could be a big couple of days for the Black and Gold.
Joby Baumuller is one of five Wheat Kings forwards who are up for the NHL draft for the first time. (Photo by Steve Hiscock)
“Being in that NHL environment, with the training and the nutrition,” Murray said, “being a pro is something we talk about here every day but when you live it and you’re beside superstars, that experience to be around those guys and understand what it takes to build a career doing what you love is really big for their development. That would really help them coming back, not only for themselves but for our younger guys who could watch them and learn from them.”
Next season’s team will have questions to answer even if all five of the prospects up for the NHL draft get selected. Replacing their 2004-born players, who finished first, second, and third in team scoring will not be easy, nor will replacing Carson Bjarnason as he moves on to the professional ranks. The Wheat Kings did, however, get some positive signs for the future in goal when Ethan Eskit took over in the back half of the series against Lethbridge and was stellar.
“Ethan is a good goalie, no question,” said Murray. “He’s athletic and a really strong competitor, his effort is never questioned. He played well whenever he was called upon, he played 25 games. He was injured, unfortunately, around Christmas when Bjarnason was gone to the World Juniors, but he worked hard in practice and was always prepared to go in the net. When he was in the net, nine times out of ten we got a really strong effort from him.”
Ethan Eskit’s final three games: a shutout win over Regina, 38 saves in his first playoff win, and a whopping 48 saves on 52 shots in game five in Lethbridge. (Photo by Mark Peterson)
Another question looming over the team going into the offseason: what are they going to do with their 2005-born players? Assuming Bjarnason leaves for the professional ranks, the team has four players from that birth year eligible to return: Quinn Mantei, Dominik Petr, Matteo Michels, and Nicholas Johnson. All four seem more than capable of holding a spot. The Wheat Kings entered training camp with four twenty-year-olds this past season as well, and it worked out for them, but Murray wasn’t certain it was something the team would do again.
“Last year, we brought four in to start the year and it creates a healthy competitive environment but also an uncomfortable one too,” he said. “Guys are wondering where things will fall, and that was where we were starting the year with four. The guys handled it well and worked hard.”
Meanwhile for Murray, referring to this time as an offseason seems disingenuous. After all, in just over three weeks a long string of drafts begins, from the Penticton Vees expansion draft to the U.S. Priority Selection in which the Wheat Kings hold the first overall pick. Then there’s the WHL Prospects draft in which, as of this writing, the Wheat Kings hold two first and two second round picks. Whether the team ends up making those picks remains to be seen, however.
“Sometimes you maybe think about picking more by position, what you need at the time, but when you have four in the first two rounds it gives us the ability to go after the best player at the time,” Murray said. “It offers some flexibility. But there are also options outside the draft. Maybe there’s a deal that makes sense that could help us that would result in that moving those picks. We’ll see what happens in the next three and a half weeks or so, but it’s nice to have options on the table.”
