You can accomplish an awful lot over the course of ten days, and the Brandon Wheat Kings will need to.
It seems incredible that the long-anticipated regular season is now just ten days away for the Wheat Kings. By the time they’re through this weekend series against the Swift Current Broncos, they’ll have just a handful of practices left until, as coaches often say, the bullets start to fly for real. It feels almost like too little time for all the Wheat Kings need to evaluate and accomplish, and yet there’s no doubt that everything that needs doing will get done.
If it feels like the Wheat Kings are keeping an awfully high number of players in competition for spots this late in the preseason, it’s because that competitive camp the team wanted is coming through in spades. None of the players left with the team are doing anything to play themselves out of contention. And on top of that, six players are away at NHL camps, the most the Wheat Kings have sent to camps in my time with the team.
In other words, there are a lot of decisions still to make, no one is making them any easier, and some of them can’t be made until the last minute. Most of the players off to NHL rookie camps won’t return until September 15 at the earliest (when rookie camps transition into main camps for most NHL teams and at which time the start of the Wheat Kings’ season is just four days away).
It’s moments like this when I’m glad I’m not a GM.
- It’s very difficult to judge the Wheat Kings based on the weekend series with the Regina Pats. Among the veterans, only Joby Baumuller played both games and Carter Klippenstein, Caleb Hadland, Luke Mistelbacher, Grayson Burzynski, Dylan Ronald, Gio Pantelas, and Jayden Kraus didn’t play at all. Merrek Arpin had to leave the lone game he played due to illness (he was plus-3 before departing the game, so that was good). Brady Turko only played in the game in Regina, during which his ice time was fairly closely managed as he’s got an NHL camp of his own to look forward to. These games were more about evaluating individual players, and that’s all to the good because as of this writing the Wheat Kings have only cut down their roster from that first game by four players, three of whom were born in 2010 and ineligible to be full-time Wheat Kings this season anyhow. The team brass will need all the evaluation opportunities they can get.
- Of the young Wheat Kings who played this past weekend, no one advanced their case more than Chase Surkan. Now, as a first round pick in 2024 I don’t think anyone expects anything less than a roster spot for the young man, especially after the season he just had with the Regina Pat Canadians, but if there was any doubt he went a long way toward erasing it this weekend. He had a beautiful setup on Prabh Bhathal’s late goal against the Pats in Regina, but it was Saturday night where he really blew the doors off. Playing alongside setup wizards Jaxon Jacobson and Jordan Gavin (the hockey IQ on that line is off the charts), he turned in a hat trick on Saturday night, showing off some incredible finishing touch to go with his set-up skills. There will be harder games ahead and a tough transition for the 16-year-old, as there are for all rookies, but when he comes out the other side of them Surkan is going to be an incredibly dangerous offensive threat.
- A good start to the preseason for Joby Baumuller, just the start the team wants to see him have in order to build confidence for a season in which they foresee big things for him. After a quieter Friday night game in Regina, he posted a three-point first period on Saturday against the Pats and looked to have some jump in his step. I liked his assist on Nick Johnson’s shorthanded goal; he knew the Pats netminder (who he’d already beaten for one goal and beaten again but hit the post) was going to cheat for his shot and knew Johnson was with him, so he shot for a rebound, got what he wanted, and watched Johnson pot his first of the preseason. It was a clever use of his heavy shot, and it worked wonders. If anything, the team might look to see him assert himself physically a little more, but the most important thing is for him to be a scorer and be willing to use that heavy shot. He ticked both boxes this weekend.
- Speaking of Nick Johnson, I’m glad he got the shorthanded goal but it was his second goal of the game on Saturday night that I think the team will be most pleased with. On the power play, he went to the front of the net, planted himself, won a battle, and earned a tap-in goal. Johnson wasn’t outmuscling an undersized 2010 born defenseman either; the Pat he beat in the net front battle was 6-foot-4 Jonas Kohn. Like Baumuller, Johnson has a great shot but the Wheat Kings have always foreseen big things for him as a net front presence on the power play. It was only one goal, but it was a great sign that Johnson is ready to take on that role if the need arises.
- We haven’t seen many of the Wheat Kings top-end forwards in preseason action, but we’ve definitely gotten a look at how they might line up their forward group this year thanks to the Black and Gold game. In that game, the lines of veterans were Jaxon Jacobson with Luke Mistelbacher and Caleb Hadland, Carter Klippenstein centering Jordan Gavin and Joby Baumuller, and Jimmy Egan flanked by Brady Turko and Nick Johnson. Now, lines can be juggled numerous times during the season, and no doubt will be, but if those are the top-three lines the Wheat Kings start the season with, their depth is going to be nearly impossible for some of their opponents to keep up with. Each line brings a little of their own flavor, but all three can score in bunches. We won’t see this group for a while yet, of course; four of the forwards listed above are at NHL camps.
- While every forward who goes to NHL camps for the Wheat Kings is a feather in their cap, I want to give special mention to Caleb Hadland, who played his way into an invitation to the New Jersey Devils’ camp. Hadland is, in my opinion, long overdue for some recognition at the NHL level. He had 25 goals last season, a mixture of goal scorer’s snipes, impressive dangles, and hard-working tallies from within a stick length of the blue paint, and on top of that he plays fearlessly and physically, a brand of hockey very much en vogue in the NHL right now. I was more than a little surprised he didn’t get a development camp invite over the summer, but I think he’s going to come as quite the surprise to New Jersey Devils fans who might not be familiar with his game. When he returns, he’ll be expected to lead this Wheat Kings’ team on many fronts, and doing so with his first taste of NHL experience under his belt will only be beneficial for both him and the team.
- So if the top three lines are set (and they’re not, but let’s use those as our template for now) what becomes of the remaining line? Well, after his hat trick on Saturday night I think I can go out on a limb and say Chase Surkan occupies part of it. Prabh Bhathal has had some great moments both in camp and in the exhibition series too, and he’s got what I’ve described in the past as a perfect complimentary skillset for Surkan. Ben Binder Nord and Easton Odut are both returning guys, 18-year-olds who are no fun to play against as the team has said they want to be. Gunnar Gleasman, in addition to his physical play, absolutely ripped a wrist shot top corner against the Pats on Saturday night. Ryan Boyce and Asher Lucas look more comfortable every single day, and more dangerous with the puck (and without it; I especially enjoyed Boyce sitting down Reese Hamilton with a heavy shoulder check on Saturday night) so… yeah, remember what I said earlier about being glad I’m not a GM? Every one of these players should get more looks with the team (with so many guys missing, the Wheat Kings have little choice) so Marty Murray and his staff will have far more data with which to make their decision by the time Sunday rolls around. Of those seven forwards, the team could keep four or five. Will anyone separate themselves one way or another in that time? We’ll find out.
- The picture doesn’t get a whole lot clearer on defense, thanks in no small part to the play of 2009-born defensemen Easten Turko and Ethan Young. Both of them could go back to AAA for their 16-year-old season and, at the start of camp, no one would’ve been shocked by that choice, but neither of them are playing like rookies. The Wheat Kings have iced a very young blueline both games so far (Pantelas, Ronald, and Burzynski are among the guys yet to play any games at all) but the youngsters have stood their ground. And Max Lavoie, who remains very much in the mix, has been as advertised so far this preseason, playing physically and abrasively against the Pats both nights. He picked up an assist against Regina on Saturday for good measure too. Again, the Wheat Kings can keep extra defensemen going into the season, but we’ve got two games left to determine who those defensemen will be.
- Among the players vying for a spot on the Swift Current Broncos, this weekend’s opponent for the Wheat Kings, is former Wheat King Tony Wilson. First of all, it’s nice to see Tony get a crack at making his hometown team as a 20-year-old. It would be a nice way to wrap up his WHL career, being close to family. Second of all, he always seems to be on his toes when he plays the Wheat Kings, as he is almost certainly going to this weekend. For him, playing on his toes can also mean playing on the edge; he delivers big and frequent hits when he lines up against his old squad. The Wheat Kings have said they want more pushback in tough physical situations this season, and Wilson, a gritty veteran with something to prove and a roster spot calling his name, seems a prime candidate to test how much pushback they really have. Either way, I’ve never gone into a Wheat Kings vs. Broncos game and expected anything less than animosity, and I doubt if preseason is likely to be much different.
The Swift Current Broncos still have some cuts to make according to their website, and the play-by-play guy in me really hopes they do because their official preseason roster remains set at 45. Now, five of those are 2010 born players who are generally trimmed from the games by this point in the proceedings but even so, 40 guys is a sizable roster. They, like the Wheat Kings, look to have some tough decisions ahead of them.
This weekend’s games will be “just preseason” for the teams and fans, but I would expect many of the players not to approach it that way. We’ll see who pulls away from the pack as the pressure mounts.
