Raise your hand if you predicted at the start of the season that, by the time of Thanksgiving weekend, the Brandon Wheat Kings would be in last place and still in pursuit of their first victory of the season.
Put your hand down, you liar.
The slow start for the Wheat Kings has caught an awful lot of people off guard, and based on my writing leading up to the season, you can probably guess that I am one of those people. I suppose it’s heartening to know I have company. Wheat Kings fans have been leaving stunned, disbelieving, gobsmacked comments on the team’s social media feeds (spare a thought for the people monitoring those pages) all effectively asking the same question: what is happening?
It’s a question that I’ve been getting asked not just by Wheat Kings fans but by people around the WHL. On Monday, in the same half-hour span, I had two people from elsewhere in the hockey world reach out to me to ask some variation of that question. I suppose if you’re reading this blog you might have a similar question yourself.
To you, the reader, I offer the same reply I offered those two gentlemen and others who have asked both online and in person: I wish I had an easy answer for that one. Even a comparatively pessimistic prediction for the Wheat Kings to start the season did not have them starting off this poorly. There have been some common threads through the early season (goals against being the most glaring by far) but each loss has very much had its own flavor, none of which have tasted very good.
Talking about games as “must-win” in early October feels alarmist and unduly harsh. But there’s no question, the Wheat Kings are in need of something to feel good about and nothing would feel better than a win.
- After a vexing, confusing, and disheartening 115 minutes of weekend hockey, the Wheat Kings suddenly flipped a switch in the final five minutes of the loss to Saskatoon, and while it was too little too late, one hopes they remember it and carry it forward. As Marty Murray said after the game, the team doesn’t promote fighting but the three fights in the final three minutes showed a willingness to stick up for their teammates and some pride in the logo. This team feels too good to be searching for moral victories, but at this stage of the season they need something to build off and letting some frustrations boil over might actually have been the healthiest thing for them (side note: it occurred to me that Gunnar Gleasman must’ve been wishing he was on the ice for this sort of shindig; if the game is going to get rough, he’s just the guy you want out there). Back-to-back power play goals didn’t hurt either. The trick now will be for the team to start a game that way rather than end it. Incidentally, if they’re looking for an opponent to match their frustration levels, the Vancouver Giants might be just the ticket, as they’ll be deep into their East Division road swing by the time they arrive in Brandon on Friday night.
- The trio of fights started off with Max Lavoie shedding the mitts for the first time in Wheat Kings colours, and he made an impression all right (pardon the expression). I had heard from Chris Moulton that he was one of the toughest guys in the MJHL last season, but it’s one thing to hear a guy can scrap, another to see him actually do it, and his heavy uppercut on Jordan Martin was probably the first domino for the Wheat Kings in that late pushback. Lavoie told me that because he saw some pretty important minutes in Winkler (he had over 30 points last season and saw power play time) he didn’t get into as many fights as he otherwise might have but he did really well in the scraps he got into. He was a small bright spot for the Wheat Kings well before the fight, competing consistently, finishing checks, and trying (and eventually succeeding) to drag his team into the fight. The penalty he took prior to that, which he got for burying a Blades forward who drove the net, is one the team will absolutely live with, especially as they’re trying to be harder to play against in the “house” area of their own zone.
- You knew Dominik Petr was going to be motivated against his former team (find me a player that wouldn’t be) and so he was, scoring one for the highlight reels in the first period and adding another goal and two assists before the night was over. He picked up where he left off last night, scoring twice again and adding an assist in the 6-1 win over the Giants. He leads the Eastern Conference in points with 11 as of now, and is absolutely rolling. He was always a great kid to deal with, so it’s hard not to root for him to succeed (you know, just not quite so much in the eight games this year he’ll face the Wheat Kings). So how did the Wheat Kings arrive at the decision to trade him on day two of this year’s prospects draft? Well, there are some factors there that will never become public, namely what other teams may have offered for other 20-year-olds, but the Wheat Kings picked up Luke Mistelbacher and Grayson Burzynski in trade the day before they moved Petr to the Blades, and you could be reasonably certain those guys were holding two of the three overage spots. At the time of Petr’s trade, the remaining three players vying for the single spot were Petr, Matteo Michels, and Nick Johnson. Johnson finished the playoff series against Lethbridge with two goals and four points in five games. Michels finished with three goals (fans will well remember his spectacular performance in a season-saving game-four). Petr finished with just two assists. Johnson and Petr both put up 21 points in 32 games in the post-World Junior schedule, and Michels (who ended up making the team’s decision for them when he left for the University of Vermont) had 26. It wasn’t likely an easy choice, but based on the information they had at the time, the Wheat Kings made a move which not only partially unclogged their 20-year-old situation but also gave them another import spot to work with. Petr had stumbled down the stretch in 2024-25 (just three assists in his final 11 games, and he was scratched in the 12th), and while a change of scenery is clearly going well for him, it was also probably necessary. Also worth remembering: at the time, the Wheat Kings thought (for good reason) they were going to be getting Roger McQueen back. This may have played a role in their decision to move a centreman.
- Like the WHL, most of the U18 AAA leagues are very early in their seasons at the moment, and the CSSHL has only just started league play, but in the early going, there are some incredibly promising signs for the Wheat Kings’ future. In fact, for a draft where they didn’t have many picks to work with at the top, the Wheat Kings certainly do seem to have punched well above their weight class for the 2024 prospects draft. Chase Surkan and Prabh Bhathal are already with the team of course (Surkan continues to lead the team in both goals and points), but Easten Turko, Ethan Young, and Carson Park have all come roaring out of the gate in their respective AAA leagues. Then there’s Carson Ralph, who had such an incredible training camp and played his way into signing with the team. He’s got four goals in his first two games in the Alberta AAA circuit. And one can’t help but look south of the border at what Colin Grubb (15 points in 14 games) and Ethan Sung (17 points in 14 games) are doing as the two youngest forwards on Shattuck St. Mary’s 18U prep team. If we’re talking Americans, you can take a look at 6-foot-6 Axel Gleasman as well, who has eight points in his first ten 16U AAA games with OHA Colorado. Oh, and between the pipes and closer to home, Urijah Moosetail has a sub-1.00 GAA through four games and a .955 save percentage. As Marty put it to me, “You look around the league, and a lot of the top teams have those guys that they hit in the sixth and seventh round, or maybe even unsigned. We feel like we have a bunch of those coming up in our system.”
- Naturally, Marty went on to say that as happy as the team is to have young guys coming up the pipeline, their biggest concern is getting into the win column in the present. To that end, practice looked more than a little intense yesterday. Close-quarters battle drills saw a lot of board rattling and guys getting shoved to the ice. Defending the front of the net also remains a central focus. In that regard, getting Grayson Burzynski back from his two-game suspension will hopefully be a huge help. He’s the team’s most experienced blue liner (and their leading scorer among defensemen) and his absence was certainly felt this past weekend.
- This one is nice and succinct: Gio Pantelas has as many assists (six) this season as he had all of last season through 61 games. If the team is looking for bright spots from the early season, his play would certainly stand out among the team’s blueliners.
- One final, similarly succinct note: it was good to see Jaxon Jacobson not only score but score the kind of goal he scored against Saskatoon. That was a pure bullet of a shot, as well-placed as a shot could be, and he beat an NHL-drafted goaltender cleanly to do it. I remember in his second season, teams were cheating to take away Brayden Yager’s shot, so he showed off his passing as a result. This season, it’s felt a couple of times like teams are cheating to take away Jacobson’s passing options, so he’ll have more room to rifle the puck. If that’s what he’s going to use that room to do, teams will have a heck of a choice to make when Jacobson has the puck on the man advantage.
I am, by nature, an upbeat an optimistic guy when it comes to the Wheat Kings (it’s been pointed out to me more than once). I still hold a tremendous amount of long-term optimism for this team. There’s no question though, even for an optimist like me, that they need to start righting the ship. Two games this weekend are an excellent place to start.
