10 WHL Things From Glen Erickson, Volume XXIII

As is always the case, proceed with caution.

1 – Hitmen Put Hammer Down – A nice run through Saskatchewan and Manitoba last week for the Calgary Hitmen. After a dominant 7-1 win in Saskatoon over the Blades, the Hitmen waltzed into the Art Hauser Centre and clipped the Prince Albert Raiders, 5-4 in overtime. Calgary has had its way with the Raiders, winning all three contests by a one-goal margin so far this season, including both games played in Prince Albert. The teams meet for the final time March 6 in Calgary. If that wasn’t a big enough win for Calgary, its comeback victory in Brandon to edge the Wheat Kings, 5-4, will surely elevate confidence. The Wheaties, depleted by the injury bug upon returning from its road trip through the U.S. Division, scored early in the final frame to take a 4-1 lead. But the Hitmen, led by rookie import Andrei Molgachev, tallied four unanswered goals to get outa dodge with the two points. A 4-3 win the next night in Regina against the Pats made it an undefeated roady.

2 – Scoring Punch – Calgary, now 29-13-6-1 for 65 points has a pretty firm handle on fourth place in the eastern conference, an eight-point lead on Brandon with a pair of games in hand. The Hitmen are getting some consistent scoring from youngsters. Forward Julien Maze, who came over in a trade with the Regina Pats, leads the Hitmen in scoring with 60 points. In 19 games with Calgary, Maze has collected 14 goals and 13 assists. But after Maze, it’s been a trio of rookies contributing with some consistency to the offensive push. Kale Dach (27-31; 58), import Andrei Molgachev (21-25; 46) and defenceman Ben MacBeath (6-32; 38) sit second, third and fourth respectively in team scoring. The Hitmen will assuredly play in the post-season. Behind Prince Albert, Medicine Hat and Edmonton, what I will refer to as a second-tier group in the eastern conference kind of intrigues me. That includes the Hitmen, Blades and Brandon Wheat Kings. Saskatoon has blue-chipper Evan Gardner in goal, the Wheaties can score in bunches and Calgary is on a roll. Which of these can make life miserable for the upper echelon teams in the playoffs?

3 – Top Scoring Overage Players – Looks like Alex Weiermair of the Portland Winterhawks is the highest scoring 20-year-old so far this season. From Los Angeles, Weiermair came over to Portland last season from the NCAA. The Winterhawks made Weiermair its first-round pick, 16^th overall, at the 2020 WHL Draft, but it took awhile to land the right-handed shooting forward. Through 50 games, Weiermair has collected 27 goals and 38 assists, good for a three-point lead ahead of Ryden Evers of the Penticton Vees. Evers, from Burnaby, is a 20-year-old rookie in his second year with Penticton after two seasons with the Surrey Eagles. Evers has chipped in with 28 goals and 34 assists in 51 games. After that, it’s Luke Mistelbacher of the Brandon Wheat Kings with 31 goals and 29 assists. Mistelbacher, from Steinbach, Manitoba landed in Brandon after three full seasons with the Swift Current Broncos. He has tallied 99 goals in regular season play during his WHL career, 42 of those last season in Speedy Creek.

4 – Marc Habscheid – It certainly takes time, but 600 career coaching wins in the WHL is a heckuva milestone. When the Red Deer Rebels managed a 3-2 victory in Prince George las week, it was a big win for the head coach. Long-in-the-tooth WHL supporters will remember Habscheid as a crafty playmaker back in the early 1980’s, scoring 100 goals and 153 assists in 142 games with the Saskatoon Blades. His career in the DUB took an interesting twist when he played six games with the Kamloops Junior Oilers during the 1982-83 campaign, where he chipped in with 23 points. He went on to play 345 NHL games and scored 72 times in the big leagues. Habscheid, from Swift Current, led the Kelowna Rockets to the 2004 Memorial Cup title as head coach. He will celebrate his 63^rd birthday on March 1.

5 – Record Breakers – Sure, records are made to be broken and I think it’s always fun to watch the chase. For much of the current campaign, Bryce Pickford of the Medicine Hat Tigers looked to be a sure thing to surpass the regular season record for goals by a defenceman. With 33 goals in his first 42 games, Pickford looked to be on a roll. The WHL record set in the Rotary Dial era by Larry Sacharuk of the Saskatoon Blades looked to be in jeopardy. Had Pickford been able to maintain his scoring prowess, a clip of .78 goals per game, the numbers suggest he was on target to tally 53 times and erase a WHL record that is over 50 years old. However Pickford, who has signed an entry level contract with the Montreal Canadiens, hasn’t played since January 20. With only 20 games to play, Pickford is listed day-to-day with an upper body injury, said to be a shoulder ailment. Even if he suits up in all 20 contests and maintains his .78 goals per game pace, the numbers now project to a total of 48 goals. The bottom line? If and when Pickford returns to the lineup, he’ll have to increase his per game output to break the record. Stay tuned.

6 – Record Breakers, Part Deux – There were many youngsters among junior hockey media closely watching the exploits of Andrew Cristall of the Spokane Chiefs during the playoffs last season. Through a dozen games, the Washington Capitals prospect had tallied 17 times. That’s 1.4 goals per game! The WHL record for goals scored in one post-season is 24, set in the Rotary Dial era during the 1976 playoffs by Blair Chapman of the Saskatoon Blades in 20 games. Cristall and the Chiefs would play seven more games last season and had he continued to score at a 1.4 goals per game pace, he would have finished with 26 goals, good for a new playoff goal scoring record. Cristall scored only four times in those last seven games and fell short with what is still impressive, a total of 21 goals. The only other player to reach 20 goals in the WHL post-season since Y2K is Ty Rattie of the Portland Winterhawks in 2013. There have been many instances in recent years by folks referencing achievements in the “modern era” in the WHL. Erasing some long-standing league records might go a long way to accomplishing making this more commonplace.

7 – Gavin McKenna – Back in the good old days which so many people today really don’t seem to care about, I recall that law enforcement personnel weren’t always quick to jump to the defence of someone who picked a fight, then finished second. The result was what we commonly understood and referred to as justice. These days, after decades of bleeding hearts commanding they be considered the smartest people in the room, what is clearly “just”, isn’t always considered legal. I’ve always taken the view that if you are seeking justice, don’t expect to find it in the law courts. Prove me wrong! Regardless, what really happened on January 31 outside a restaurant, said to be Doggie’s Pub near Penn State University, was deemed serious enough by local authorities to bring forward charges against the 18-year-old. McKenna’s life for now will be played out in a manner he likely never, ever envisioned, even with the felony charge off the table. Time will tell how it all shakes down, and I wonder how complicated it becomes given McKenna is a Canadian citizen residing and working in the USA. I don’t see the hockey world losing any sleep at all over this incident. I do expect the powers-that-be will stick to the modern-day script and say all the politically correct things in the public domain. But behind closed doors, I think hockey types understand full well that a punk who mouths off deserves to pay the tab. Stay tuned.

8 – Ultimate Bounce Back – How do you suppose the ferry ride from Vancouver Island to the lower mainland went for the Kamloops Blazers last week? The Blazers walloped the Victoria Royals Tuesday at the Save On Foods Memorial Arena, 11-1. Victoria actually opened the scoring, then trailed 4-1 after the first frame, gave up a deuce in the second stanza, then five more in the third. There were four minor penalties in the game, so this was an absolute snoozer for Royals fans. Less than 24 hours later, the teams got back at each other and the Royals dominated territorial play, outshot the Blazers 35-20, and managed a 4-1 victory. Predictably, the second game of the doubleheader was played before fewer spectators. The B.C. Division rivals will meet two more times this season, both contests at the Sandman Centre in Kamloops. The Blazers are 25-17-5-2 for 60 points and fourth place in the western conference, while the Royals are 21-21-5-3 for 50 points, one point out of a playoff berth.

9 – Games of The Week – There are at least two I’ll be keeping an eye on this week as the league-leading Everett Silvertips embark on its road trip through the Central Division. The Silvertips, 41-6-2-1 for 85 points are on a nine-game winning streak. Wednesday in Edmonton, Everett takes on the Oil Kings. Then Saturday, on Valentine’s Day in Medicine Hat, the Silvertips tangle with the Tigers. It’s conceivable one of the tilts could be a preview of the WHL Championship Series. Each of the teams is dealing with some nagging injuries, but it’s their respective roster depth that makes them all so dangerous. Of note in the contest at Co-Op Place in Medicine Hat, the Tigers posses perhaps the top two import defencemen from Finland; Veeti Vaisanen (Utah-NHL) and Niilopekka Muhonen (Dallas-NHL). It can be argued the Silvertips possess the top two Finnish forwards in the league, Julius Miettinen (Seattle-NHL) and WHL rookie scoring leader Matias Vanhanen. Three of the four Finns played together for Finland at the 2026 World Junior Championship in Minnesota. Muhonen was the exception. He had missed 21 games due to a lower-body injury suffered at Dallas Stars training camp. He didn’t return to the Tigers lineup until well into December. 

10 – RANDOMS – The National Football League delivered yet another Super Bore, confirming that two weeks of hype doesn’t always result in a classic championship game. We had some fun when one of our group, neither a sports fan or a music aficionado, asked why Bugs Bunny was on at half time. While she won’t live that one down for awhile, a number of us agreed we would have happy if she’d been correct…One of my favorite PGA Tour events takes place this week at Pebble Beach. What a fabulous golf course!…Have a look at the current USPORTS Men’s Hockey standings when you can. The Canada West conference has been split into two divisions, with Saskatchewan and Mount Royal leading the way. USPORTS hockey is perhaps the best kept secret in the sport nationwide, fed predominantly by CHL graduates. The quality of play seems so under rated and I cannot believe national broadcasters in Canada continue to ignore USPORTS Men’s Hockey in favour of the NCAA version or the PWHL.

(Glen Erickson is a freelance hockey writer based in Medicine Hat, AB)