More from Monday

The Prince George Cougars traded F Cody Rainaldi, 19, to the Portland Winter Hawks for future considerations. Rainaldi, from Campbell River, B.C., played last season with the Manitoulin Islanders of the NOJHL. He had 44 points in 47 games. He had one assist in three games with the Cougars. . . . P.G. now is down to 25 players, including eight defencemen and 15 forwards.
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The Spokane Chiefs, it appears, will be without C Mitch Wahl for a game or two. He has been suspended by the WHL office under supplemental discipline from Friday's game with the visiting Everett Silvertips. The suspension will be finalized once the WHL office concludes its investigation into whatever happened. . . . The Chiefs next play Friday when they are in Portland.
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D Matt Strong of the Chilliwack Bruins injured a shoulder in a fight on Friday in Prince George and, according to GM Darrell May, it doesn’t look good. “Matt’s going to be gone for a while and it doesn’t look very good,” May told Eric J. Welsh of the Chilliwack Progress. “Now we’re down to seven defencemen and that’s actually more of a workable number. But things certainly are piling up right now.”
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You may have noticed Greg Evtushevski, the former Kamloops Blazers sniper, in a TV commercial plugging Source for Sports. Yes, Chevy is a national TV star! And now comes word that his Kelowna store has been nominated for one of that city’s Business Excellence awards. Chevy’s Source for Sports was nominated in the Business Award 2 category, which is for those businesses with six to 20 employees. The 21st annual awards dinner is set for Oct. 22 at the Delta Grand Okanagan Lakefront Resort. The awards are presented by the Kelowna Chamber of Commerce and co-sponsored by the Business Development Bank of Canada (BDC) and Farris, Vaughan, Wills & Murphy LLP. . . . Chevy’s Source for Sports is up against Avalon Event Rentals Inc., and Kitchenhaus Cabinets Ltd.
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Congratulations to Steve Hildebrand, the trainer for the Saskatoon Blades. He worked his 500th WHL game on Sunday. The Blades beat the visiting Medicine Hat Tigers 5-2, so you know that Hildebrand really enjoyed that milestone. . . . The Blades meet the Wheat Kings in Brandon on Tuesday night and then head into Alberta for games Friday (Edmonton), Saturday (Red Deer) and Sunday (Calgary). D Jyri Niemi, who returned from the New York Islanders’ camp with a wonky back, and F Mike Reich (eight-game suspension) should play on the weekend. Reich completes his suspension with the Tuesday game in Brandon.
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Mike Moore, the former general manager of the Kamloops Blazers and Medicine Hat Tigers, is the Calgary Hitmen’s new director of business operations. Moore, who has a Bachelor of Arts in Social Sciences and a Masters of Business Administration from the U of Calgary, has been at Edge School in Calgary for the last few years, serving as director of athletics. Moore actually is returning to the Hitmen – he was their assistant GM in 1997-98 and also did some scouting for them.
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It appears that D Luke Schenn, C Colton Gillies and C Oscar Moller all will start the season in the NHL. Schenn (Kelowna Rockets) will open with the Toronto Maple Leafs, while Gillies (Saskatoon Blades) is with the Minnesota Wild and Moller (Chilliwack Bruins) has stuck with the Los Angeles Kings.
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“(Schenn’s) not going anywhere at the start of the year,” Leafs GM Cliff Fletcher told the Toronto Star on Monday. “You look at him (in a 5-4 shootout loss to the Columbus Blue Jackets on Sunday), and he was the best defenceman on the ice for both teams. So he’ll be around at the start of the year, then we’ll make a critical decision around the end of October.” . . . If Schenn, who turns 19 on Nov. 2, was the best defenceman on the ice, well, that’s good news for him and really, really bad news for the Leafs and the Blue Jackets. . . . But wait, there’s more. Here’s Toronto head coach Ron Wilson, in conversation with The Canadian Press: “I could easily say he’s on our team and it makes me a better coach because I have a better defenceman than some of the other guys. But we have to think about what’s best for Luke’s development, where is he going to be as a player in three years if he plays here, where is he going to be in three years if we send him back to junior? The most impressive thing was (against Columbus). He did not play very well against Detroit at home, and (Sunday) he bounced right back and was easily our best defenceman. That showed us a lot about Luke right there.” . . . Schenn was “easily” Toronto’s best defenceman? Again, great news for Schenn and really, really bad news for the Leafs and their other defencemen.
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“I talked to (Wild general manager) Doug Risebrough this morning, just before practice, and he said, ‘Congratulations. You’ve made the team,’ ” Gillies told Cory Wolfe of the Saskatoon StarPhoenix on Monday. “He pulled me into his office. I kind of knew (it was good news) because they made most of the cuts (Sunday), but it was just nice to hear him say it.” The Wild took Gillies with the 16th pick of the 2007 NHL draft. The 6-foot-4, 190-pounder had two points in six exhibition games with the Wild.
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As for Moller’s status, Chilliwack GM Darrell May told Eric J. Welsh of the Chilliwack Progress: “They can keep him for the entire season if they wish, but after nine games they have to pay him full salary for the year and it counts as one year towards his free agency. They haven’t returned my call yet, but we’re still optimistic about him coming back. It sure does leave us with a hole, but it happens and we have to move on.”
It looks like Moller is to start the season on what would be the Kings’ second line, alongside Jarret Stoll and Alexander Frolov.
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One player who isn’t staying in the NHL is D Thomas Hickey, who was returned to the Seattle Thunderbirds on Monday. Hickey, 19, was the fourth overall pick in the NHL’s 2007 draft. He should play Friday in Everett.
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The good folks of Penticton have opened their new arena – the $78.5-million, 5,100-seat South Okanagan Events Centre -- but they shouldn’t hold their breath waiting for a WHL franchise. Penticton is less than 100km from Kelowna and every WHL franchise holds league rights within that radius. As Kelowna president/governor/GM Bruce Hamilton told the Kelowna Daily Courier’s Doyle Potenteau: “We own the Western Hockey League rights to both Penticton and Vernon. So, no, we would not give up (our radius). The WHL isn’t going to move to Penticton, and that’s not a slight to Penticton. They have a fabulous new arena and they have a good junior A operation there.”