It’s been a solid enough road trip for the Brandon Wheat Kings so far, and with two games remaining on it, they’ve got time to turn it from a good one into a great one.
By virtue of a pair of wins south of the border, the Wheat Kings are already ahead of where they finished on their last foray below the 49th, as in 2023 they opened up with back-to-back wins over Lethbridge and Tri-City and then weren’t able to find a win the rest of the way (though their final two losses came in overtime). One more win, and they’ll finish this seven-game swing above .500. Two more wins, and they finish with a very impressive 5-2 record.
Neither of the remaining teams are likely to make that easy, of course, and the road itself will start to play a role the later into the trip things go. Injury, weariness, and illness will all become factors (including for the radio announcer; I did my best to hide it and I hope this comes as a surprise, but the broadcast from Seattle was one of the toughest of my career and it had nothing to do with the score).
As I write this, the bus ride to Kennewick is well into its second half and the laughter from the back of the bus carries easily to the front. An animated card game is taking place, and I marvel that after nearly two weeks stuck on busses and in hotel rooms together, these guys don’t seem to be the least bit sick of each other.
Of course, the winning doesn’t hurt.
- Last season, the Wheat Kings had only one 30-goal scorer (Marcus Nguyen) and he hit the 30-goal barrier on February 26 in a win over the Edmonton Oil Kings. This season, almost a month earlier than “Marv” hit the mark, the Wheat Kings got their second 30-goal man of the season when Luke Mistelbacher sniped what proved to be the game-winner against Wenatchee. Now, the Wheat Kings would need somebody to absolutely floor the gas pedal in the final 21 games to get a third 30-goal guy (though they ought to have at least a couple more guys break 20, especially once Chase Surkan returns) but this is more high-end firepower than the team has had in my time covering them for certain. And I don’t know if I’ve ever covered a player with a hotter hand than Mistelbacher has right now. With ten goals in his last eight games, he’s surging along and picking an excellent time to do so, helping steer a road-weary Wheat King group to their three wins so far.
- By now I’m fast running out of things to say about Joby Baumuller that don’t force me to repeat myself. What’s left to be said? The Wilcox native just keeps finding ways to score (sometimes, as was the case on his first goal against Wenatchee, even when he’s not trying to). As ever, I’ll bang the someone-should-have-drafted-this-kid drum. He continues to be underrated as well, ranking 169th on NHL central scouting’s latest list, which feels low for a possible 50-goal scorer, even one entering his second year of eligibility. He holds a two-goal lead atop the WHL goal scoring race, a race a Wheat King hasn’t won in a full season since 2006-07 when current assistant coach Mark Derlago did it. Shoutout to Lynden McCallum, who led the WHL in goals in the shortened 2021 season and never got a chance to extend that over a full campaign as he graduated to the pro ranks the following season.
- Baumuller and Mistelbacher’s two-goal games in Wenatchee helped the Wheat Kings continue a surprising and impressive trend. The Black and Gold have played back-to-back road games six times this season in which they had to travel overnight in between the two games. They’re 5-1 in the back halves of those six sets of contests. Considering the team still has one of those back-to-backs to contend with to wrap up this road trip, that’s a huge positive, and a good sign of resilience. That’s part of the reason the Wheat Kings have just two losing streaks all season to this point, and also part of the reason they have more road wins than home wins despite fewer games played on the road. In fact, it’s the second season in a row the Wheat Kings have been “road warriors” and own one of the best road records in the Eastern Conference, trailing only Prince Albert and Edmonton in the road wins category.
- It’s strange to look at the standings and realize how differently the Eastern and Western Conferences shake out in the middle of the standings. With their record, the Wheat Kings would be just three points back of the Prince George Cougars for third in the West. By contrast, the biggest logjam in the West appears to be right around the playoff line. As of this writing, every team in the Western Conference would be a playoff team in the East if the playoffs began today, including the last-placed Wenatchee Wild. The ninth place team out west, the Spokane Chiefs, are a .500 team and would be in seventh place, comfortably nine points above the playoff line out east. And those last few games and the push for the playoffs are going to be a dogfight. The Seattle Thunderbirds are right in the thick of that race as well, and talk about a team that’s miles better than their record. Some of that has to do with the added depth since January 1, but that forward group is, as the Wheat Kings learned the hard way, highly dangerous. The T-Birds racked up seven goals in the game without any goals from (at the time) the league leader in Cameron Schmidt. The race for the eighth spot in the west is going to be one for the ages. And the reward for all that hard work? A showdown with Everett, who as far as I saw are every bit the powerhouse they were advertised to be.
- One of the little joys of this job is watching players grow year over year and, in many cases, within the year. There are no shortage of candidates for the most-improved Wheat King from the start of the season, but if we’re going back to the start of the road trip, my pick is Gunnar Gleasman. Even before the game against Wenatchee and his perfectly placed shot off the rush, I talked with Marty Murray about the confidence Gunnar was showing every time he was on the ice. He doesn’t overcomplicate his game, and his style doesn’t lend itself to overcomplicating, but he’s far more comfortable both carrying and shooting the puck, and that was true even before his goal in Wenatchee. Probably the first and most noticeable leap forward came in Portland, where Marty said Gunnar’s line was probably their best in the early going. And he’s still finishing checks and mixing it up after the whistle, doing all the things the Wheat Kings hoped he would do when they signed him after training camp.
- Another little joy of the job: seeing a player’s first WHL point. For Levi Ellingsen, getting an assist on Gleasman’s goal with friends and family in attendance just up the road from where he grew up, that first point carried some extra significance. As Marty pointed out, it’s a lot to ask of a 15-year-old to jump into the lineup mid-season and mid-road trip, especially against opponents as physical and generally mature as many of these U.S. teams are, yet Levi is handling the pace of play and physicality well (he’s dished out his share of physicality too, which won’t surprise anyone who saw him in training camp). His homecoming against Tri-City tomorrow will be a special moment.
- One player who seems to be right at home in the high-intensity and highly competitive U.S. division is Max Lavoie. Again, it won’t surprise many people that a player of his style would be at home in an environment where games have a little more bite to them. Not only has he been a lynchpin on the penalty kill (which is 16-for-17 on the U.S. portion of the trip so far) with his shot blocking and crease clearing, he’s gotten some rewards on the scoresheet as well with two assists in his last three games. Lavoie is in a similar boat to Nigel Boehm in that his game is often at its best when one doesn’t notice him, so you almost feel guilty for singling him out for praise. But sometimes you can do the less-noticed things so well that it’s hard not to notice. Such is the case with Lavoie.
The drive from Wenatchee to Kennewick takes the Wheat Kings through almost desert-like terrain, dominated by rock outcroppings and sagebrush-covered hills. Yet again I find myself grateful some of the drives on this road trip are being done in daylight. There are safety considerations there (the road both to and from Wenatchee is winding and runs through rocky hills) but also there’s something very easy on the eyes about the terrain here. Everyone I’ve spoken to agrees the change of scenery is a welcome one every now and then.
That’s not to suggest, of course, that the Wheat Kings won’t be happy to get back home when the time comes. Sleeping in one’s own bed after two weeks of hotel rooms is a fantastic feeling. But the Wheat Kings still have some work to do to make sure the homecoming is as happy as possible.
It’s a long bus ride back from Spokane to Brandon. The mood of that long bus ride is to be determined and rests firmly with the Wheat Kings themselves.
