Sometimes, two weeks can absolutely fly by. I suspect, however, that for both myself and the people dedicated enough to be reading a junior hockey blog in August, the next two weeks might drag on just a little bit.
In two weeks, players will begin arriving back in Brandon for Wheat Kings training camp, and just a few short days after that, training camp will actually begin. The storylines that come out of that camp will be enough to produce a half dozen of these posts on their own, and that’s all before the puck drops on an actual season or even preseason. A hockey itch ignored all summer is finally about to be scratched.
A lot can happen, ordinarily, in two weeks, but the Wheat Kings are no doubt hoping it doesn’t. Because while several good things have happened since my most recent blog post, a few less than helpful things have happened as well.
We’ve had all summer to pick apart the roster, speculate on who might return and who might take the biggest leap forward, and with all the drafts now done, a trade freeze in effect, and most of the NCAA commitments having shaken out, we’re passed the point where we can gain anything by speculation or learn anything new about this roster without actually seeing it. The time to collect more concrete data on this Wheat Kings team is nearly upon us.
- The biggest piece of news for the Wheat Kings, and arguably the entire WHL in the last couple of weeks, came when Roger McQueen announced his commitment to Providence in the NCAA just before the August Long Weekend. It’s a gut punch for the Wheat Kings, no question, as they’ve lost their number one centre in a potential championship year, a year they’ve been building up to since they drafted Roger in 2021. It’s also a gut punch, however, that the team is uniquely conditioned to take. Chatting with Marty Murray, he pointed out the team had to play without Roger for most of 2024-25 and more than kept up with the rest of the division. Last season, Marty and I talked often about the fact that one silver lining of Roger’s injury was the number of young players who had to step up and take on a larger role sooner than expected. Those players, now a year older, get to run with that extra responsibility properly. I’m not going to pretend the loss means nothing; the Wheat Kings would infinitely rather have kept their top returning forward. I’m also not going to pretend the timing didn’t sting. As one online commenter rightly pointed out, the Wheat Kings couldn’t very well have replaced McQueen if they’d known earlier (how many 6-foot-6 right-shot top-ten NHL picks are there kicking around the trade market at any given time?) but could they perhaps have done something different at the import draft? Believing their forward core secure, they selected two defensemen and a goaltender, one of whom they’re not sure they’ll see until 2026. But as much as Roger’s departure is an obstacle, the goal hasn’t changed. The Wheat Kings still believe in the group they have assembled.
- So what about that group they have assembled? Who steps up and fills the void left by Roger’s commitment to Providence? Well, the Wheat Kings do still have the only returning 40-goal scorer in the Eastern Conference and the leading returning goal scorer in the entire league in Luke Mistelbacher, so that’s a good place to start. The team envisioned him playing with Roger, of course, but even with that no longer being an option, having a player who’s fresh off a 40-goal, 90-point season is a pretty good starting point. I’ll be curious to see who he forms chemistry with over the course of training camp. A player who’s going to show up in a later bullet point on this blog seems a good candidate.
- Of the top-ten picks in the 2021 WHL prospects draft, eight were forwards, and with the recent commitment of Ollie Josephson to UND (that was a smack on the nose for the Red Deer Rebels, no doubt), five of those eight will be in the NCAA next season. There’s a chance a sixth, first overall pick Berkly Catton, is in the NHL. One of the two remaining players from that list is former second-overall pick Jordan Gavin. I spoke to Jordan last week about his offseason, and you get the sense his NHL draft snub has just become fuel for a fire with him. He’s spent all summer trying to get faster, a major upgrade to what was already unquestionably a top-tier offensive arsenal. When I asked which players will need to step up in Roger’s absence, Marty mentioned Jordan right away, and after talking to him I’d say he’s eager for the challenge. He’s approaching this year with a “prove them wrong” mentality that I think Wheat Kings fans will greatly appreciate.
- Another player who’s going to need to step up, perhaps most directly and sooner than the team had planned on, is Jaxon Jacobson. He’s by no means the most veteran player on the roster but he is one of if not the most talented and, critically, he’s a centreman. I was downright confused when Canada left him off their Hlinka Gretzky Cup team, and watching them today I can’t help but think he’d improve that squad, but if he, like Gavin, channels that rejection into determination, he’s going to have a season to remember. One thing to consider with Jaxon, and I’ll likely bring this up quite a bit: as the league gets younger this is going to be the first time in his career, going all the way back to his youngest days of organized hockey, where Jaxon is regularly playing against players younger than himself. As a December birthday, he’s always been the youngest guy on the ice, even in his U18 AAA days, and while there were a handful of games against 2009-born players last season here and there due to call-ups, this is the first time in his life he’s going to face younger opponents on a daily basis. What might that do for a player who has done nothing but produce against constantly older competition?
- Speaking of the Hlinka Gretzky Cup, gigantic congratulations are in order for Gio Pantelas on making Team Canada. It’s a massive achievement any year, always one of the hardest Canadian squads to make, but I’m not sure I can overstate how big of a deal it is Gio made this blueline in particular. I’ve been saying for some time now the 2008-born crop of WHL blueliners is the best I’ve seen, and they’ve come together to make up perhaps the best defense corps Canada has ever put together at this event. For Gio to be part of this group is an enormous feather in his cap. He didn’t get a ton of ice time in the tournament opener today (he came in listed as the seventh defenseman so that’s to be expected) but he looked good on the shifts he got, making simple but effective plays, skating well, and throwing one particularly heavy standup hit in the neutral zone. Gio told me when I spoke to him last week he’d tried to pack on muscle this offseason, which he thought would help him play a more physical style. The result: he now weighs 214 pounds most of which, he says, is in his upper body. That extra bulk certainly doesn’t seem to be slowing him down. Packing on 15 pounds of muscle is a months if not years long endeavor for most people, so for Gio to have done so in one offseason while maintaining his speed is a remarkable achievement. I can’t wait to see the on-ice results of it. At least one Finnish player has already seen the results, I suppose.
- The 20-year-old situation has resolved itself for the Brandon Wheat Kings this year. Forwards Nick Johnson and Matteo Michels both committed to NCAA schools, but after some consideration it looks like Matteo is headed to Vermont a year early while Nick is coming back for one last hurrah with Brandon. On one hand, I’m sorry to see Matteo go. A cheerful, easy to talk to young man who was always a pleasure to deal with, he also brought electrifying speed to the team every time he was on the ice. On the other hand, I’m thrilled Nick is staying with the Wheat Kings. His heavy shot and physical play, assets at any time of year, are especially important for teams who want to go deep in the playoffs, and the Wheat Kings certainly want that this season. He almost certainly would’ve broken the 20-goal barrier last season had he been healthy, and his net front presence on the power play was invaluable. Incidentally, I have to say I got a chuckle out of his offseason training regimen. In addition to the traditional skating and working out, he’s been up at 6:00 AM most days working construction. In other words, a player who already showed his strength plenty of times (him bowling over Terrell Goldsmith of all people on a reverse hit was a little moment that sticks out in my mind) is going to come to camp even stronger. And he joins a crop of 2005-born players featuring Mistelbacher and defenseman Grayson Burzynski. Looking at the list of 2005-born players who’ve left for the NCAA already, the Wheat Kings enter the season with one of the league’s better crops of 20-year-olds.
- There was one more move for the Wheat Kings between now and when I last wrote one of these, and that was a potentially huge one: the team acquired Jayden Kraus from Victoria in exchange for Ethan Eskit. Again we see a departure that’s tough for me personally as I really liked Ethan on and off the ice. He’s a great kid and I know he’s going to have a ton of success wherever he ends up. But it seems the Wheat Kings have gotten an equally A-calibre young man in Kraus. The excitement to be back on the prairies practically radiates off the Prince Albert native, and he’s bursting with enthusiasm to get started. It’s nice to hear from a young man who so obviously just wants to be where he is. So what makes him an upgrade in goal, aside from his stature (he stands 6-foot-2)? There are two things the Wheat Kings honed in on, as he and Eskit had very similar stats last season. One was the sheer number of games played. Kraus played 46 games last season, a starter’s workload, and that was something that was going to be new to Eskit. The other thing Marty mentioned to me when I talked about him was that Kraus had not only already experienced an NHL development camp with the Colorado Avalanche, he’d earned an invite back to their camp in the fall. The experience factor both in and out of the WHL couldn’t be ignored with Kraus.
- One more quick note for the Wheat Kings internationally: U.S. prospects Colin Grubb and Ethan Sung just co-led a four-nations tournament in scoring with eight points each for Team USA. Neither player has officially committed yet as to where they’ll play next season. And with the NCAA now open to CHL players, the Wheat Kings might look like an excellent option as a stepping stone toward their college goals (especially for Grubb, who was born just up the road in Minot and whose family already knows Marty Murray well from his time there with the NAHL’s Minotauros). Nothing official from the team yet, but I wouldn’t be at all surprised to see either or both of those players at camp.
As mentioned earlier, we are out of the time where speculation can do us any good. We know the Wheat Kings’ roster for the most part by now, we know which rookies are likely to make a name for themselves and earn a roster spot at camp, we know which veterans will be called on to carry the most mail so to speak, and we’re beginning to get a sense of which teams around them are building to a contending window. The only thing that can teach us more about this team is actual ice sessions. And those are under three weeks away.
Start the countdown.
