Blades restock roster during WHL draft, while local players picked at a record pace

“It’s a year’s worth of work distilled into seven or eight hours.”

Published May 11, 2023  •  4 minute read

Sixteen of the SMHA players chosen in Thursday's WHL draft gather for a photo.
Sixteen of the SMHA players chosen in Thursday’s WHL draft gather for a photo. Photo by Michelle Berg /Saskatoon StarPhoenix

While the Saskatoon Blades stocked their prospect cupboards Thursday and traded a goalie in the process, Saskatoon Minor Hockey Association players found puck homes at a record pace.

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Seventeen SMHA players were selected in the Western Hockey League prospects draft, breaking the old mark of 16.

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“My family was really excited. We jumped in the air, and hugged each other,” Saskatoon forward Caine Wilke — selected by the Everett Silvertips in the first round, 20th overall — said Thursday, describing a scene that played out in many area homes.

Wilke, who collected 28 goals and 71 points in 29 games with the Saskatoon Stallions U15 AA squad, has a brother, Trae, who plays for the Lethbridge Hurricanes. Trae was a second-round pick in 2021.

“I doesn’t matter where you go, what pick,” Caine Wilke said when asked if he’d received any advice from his older sibling. “Just always give it your all.”

While little celebrations broke out in homes across the city, the Blades got to work on their organizational depth. They made an early splash, trading goalie Ethan Chadwick to Everett for a second-round pick Thursday, and a 2025 fourth rounder. Then they made three second-round selections, all from Calgary — forwards Zachery Olsen and Cooper Williams and goalie Ryley Budd — and ended up with 12 players all together.

“It’s a year’s worth of work distilled into seven or eight hours,” Blades’ general manager Colin Priestner said of the always-challenging draft day. “There’s decisions that can have a big impact on the future of the team, that you have to make in five seconds sometimes — a team presents you with something, and you have to decide on the spot whether you want to stick with the original plan, or deviate and go with what someone’s offering you.

“Or maybe you’re the one trying to instigate offers with somebody else, to achieve something you don’t have on your current pick chart or your roster. It’s definitely a fun day. It’s stressful, but it’s one of the days we look forward to most on the calendar.”

The Chadwick deal is one Priestner thinks is logical, given the circumstances — two goalies, including Austin Elliott, heading into their 19-year-old seasons, both with legitimate claims to the top job.

“We had two guys who were clearly starting goalies in the league,” Priestner said. “We felt it wasn’t fair for them anymore to be splitting games and to be running a tandem, when they’re clearly both worthy of being starters and getting that load of games as 19 year olds. It just made a lot of sense for us to move on with one of them.”

So he let the league’s other general managers know he had a goalie available, and he thinks Everett is a good fit for Chadwick, who is from Saskatoon.

That means Elliott is the starting goaltender, and Evan Gardner — a third-round pick in 2021, who Priestner feels has a bright future — is the backup.

“We felt it was the right thing to do to set the tandem now, and get both guys comfortable over the summer with what their situations are going to be,” Priestner said.

Priestner’s other trade was dealing Saskatoon’s first-round pick, 20th overall, to Medicine Hat for the Tigers’ second-rounder (29th overall), plus their fifth-round pick, and a second-rounder in 2024.

Of the three second-rounders, he says the six-foot-plus Olsen is “an absolute bear of a player” who wouldn’t be out of place if he played some games as a 15 year old; he won’t be a dynamic playmaker, but is a “captain-level kid” who Priestner thinks will go to the net hard and get points from speed, power and tenacity.

He said Williams is a “very, very intelligent player” who snuck up on people this year, and he sees him as a top-two-line player.

Budd, rated by the Blades as the best goalie in the draft, has “an outstanding work ethic, and he’s extremely dedicated to becoming a pro goalie.”

The Blades also took two Saskatoon players Thursday: Defenceman Jack Lavallee, and forward Luke Senick.

In Wednesday’s U.S. priority draft, the Blades picked Daniel Peate, a forward from Anaheim, and Colorado-based defenceman Luke Host.

kemitchell@postmedia.com

twitter.com/kmitchsp

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