What had been a celebratory week for the Wheat Kings, including several prospects being named to national team camps, the signing of Finnish defenseman Ilari Kapanen, and goaltender Filip Ruzicka signing his entry level contract, took a bit of a turn thanks to a sudden and very precise trade request.
The Wheat Kings announced today they have traded defenseman Gio Pantelas to the Penticton Vees. Returning from Penticton are a first-round pick in 2029, a conditional first-round pick in 2030, a third-round pick in 2028, and the rights to 2010-born forward prospect Carter Morris.
“Sitting here in July,” said Wheat Kings head coach and GM Marty Murray, “or any other time over the course of the summer, the last thing on my plate would’ve been to try to move Gio Pantelas. I’ll be brutally honest, the family asked for him to be moved. At the end of the season, everything was great, Gio was coming back and that was the message we received right up until after an article in the Brandon Sun about some NCAA thoughts, and we talked to him between the draft and that interview. We made a case for why the Western Hockey League is probably best for him right now, and he respected that.”
Pantelas was selected in the fifth round by the Los Angeles Kings at the 2026 NHL Entry Draft, and the plan seemed to be for him to return to Brandon. That plan shifted very suddenly, however.
“Probably three or four days ago, we were faced with an ultimatum of ‘As we speak, he’s on a visit to an NCAA school’,” said Murray. “The parents said that he’s either going to go to school or the only team he would consider playing for would be Penticton. This will give him an opportunity to be closer to home and to live with family for a year.”
Faced with a choice between losing Pantelas for nothing or making a trade work with the lone team to whom he would accept a trade, the Wheat Kings chose the latter.
“It’s obviously a really difficult decision,” Murray said. “What do you do? Do you call his bluff or try to work things out? But it seemed kind of beyond that, and we weren’t going to get down that road. To lose a player of his caliber for nothing would be an extra kick in the stomach. We had a lot of meetings over the last few days and reluctantly decided this was the path we needed to go down for the betterment of our organization.”
The trade leaves the Wheat Kings with a hole in their roster on the back end. Pantelas had been an all-situations defenseman playing north of 20 minutes every single night despite being 17 for the entirety of last season. The assets the Wheat Kings brought in via trade may well be used down the line to help plug that gap.
“There wasn’t a defenseman they were willing to talk about that could come in and fill the void,” Murray said. “So we moved to asset capital. Getting the first round picks and a relatively high one in a third round rounder is something we have the potential to use. We see all the trades that go on throughout the season or in the summer, there’s usually a lot of draft capital involved.”
Morris’s rights were also an intriguing add. The Anchorage, Alaska product played for the 16U AAA squad with Shattuck St. Mary’s last season where he posted 38 goals and 81 points in 51 games. He’s committed to the United States National Team Development Program for his U17 season.
“Carter Morris is one of the top 2010-born U.S. players,” said Murray. “He’s playing with the National Team Development Program right now, so it doesn’t help us right now but he’s a guy that once he’s done his commitment there, we might see him in a Wheat Kings’ jersey. But we’ll see how everything shakes out.”
Murray stressed that the plan for the Wheat Kings’ this season and the standard for them have not changed. For now, the team will now look to their younger defensemen, a promising and highly decorated group, to fill some of the void.
“We feel good about our younger group of defensemen,” said Murray. “We’ll probably have four rookie defensemen if you count (Ilari Kapanen), and these guys are champing at the bit to make an impression in camp, so there’s a lot to work with on the back end.”
Murray also said that as tough as the move was to make, the team is prepared to move forward with the group they have while still using their newly and previously acquired draft capital to seek improvements if necessary.
