Blazers, Cougars cut a deal

By GREGG DRINNAN
Daily News Sports Editor
The shaping of the Kamloops Blazers’ roster continued Sunday as the WHL team moved out two veteran defencemen.
Kurt Torbohm, 19, who played two full seasons here, was traded to the Prince George Cougars for a sixth-round pick in the 2011 bantam draft.
Matt Cumming, 18, a Kamloops native who played the last two seasons with the Cougars, was released by the Blazers.
Those moves left the Blazers with 26 players on their roster – two goaltenders, eight defencemen and 16 forwards. That includes forwards Dalibor Bortnak (spleen) and Colin Smith (broken arm), who won’t play until sometime in late October, and forwards Tyler Shattock (St. Louis Blues) and Jimmy Bubnick (Atlanta Thrashers), who are in camp with NHL teams.
Bubnick, a sixth-round selection by Atlanta in the NHL’s 2009 draft, is expected to play in rookie games today and Tuesday against the visiting Nashville Predators and then return to Kamloops.
The Blazers don’t have any idea when they might again see Shattock, who was a fourth-round pick in the 2009 draft. He scored a goal in a Sunday scrimmage that ended in a 1-1 tie in St. Louis. (The Blues split their camp roster into three teams but Shattock and defenceman Darryl Sydor, one of the Blazers’ five owners, aren’t on the same team.)
Cumming, who turns 18 on Nov. 7, had five assists in 86 games over the last two seasons with Prince George. The writing was on the wall for him here after general manager Craig Bonner, saying he was concerned about the ability of his defencemen to move the puck, acquired Bronson Maschmeyer, 18, from the Vancouver Giants on Sept. 3.
Torbohm, from Chase, was the 86th overall selection in the 2005 WHL bantam draft. Dean Clark, now the Cougars’ head coach, was running the Blazers at that time. In going to Prince George, Torbohm will join goaltender James Priestner, defenceman Daniel Medland-Marchen and forward Alex Rodgers, all of them former Blazers.
Last season, Torbohm had four assists and 110 penalty minutes in 59 games. He played especially well in the season’s early going, but then suffered a concussion, missed a few games and, when he returned, never appeared to regain his form. He soon fell out of favour with the coaching staff and was a healthy scratch in a handful of games down the stretch.
His departure leaves the Blazers with six defencemen off last season’s roster – Giffen Nyren, 20, Curtis Kulchar and Zak Stebner, both 19, Josh Caron and Linden Saip, 18, and Brandon Underwood, 17, along with Maschmeyer, 18, and freshman Tyler Hansen, a 16-year-old from Lethbridge who was the 66th overall selection in the 2008 bantam draft.
Torbohm was dealt to the Cougars on the day after they dumped the visiting Blazers 5-1 in the final exhibition game for both teams.
Bonner and Dallas Thompson, the Cougars' general manager, were huddled together on more than one occasion Friday night as they discussed a possible Torbohm deal.
The Blazers open the regular season Friday in Chilliwack against the Bruins, with a rematch the next night at Interior Savings Centre. The Cougars open with a Friday-Saturday doubleheader against the visiting Spokane Chiefs.
Left-winger Shayne Wiebe, who had six points in the Blazers’ 8-3 whipping of the visiting Cougars on Friday night, scored the game’s first goal Saturday, but the Cougars (2-2-0-1) got the next five goals to win going away. They outshot the Blazers (2-4-0-1), 46-16, with Jon Groenheyde going the distance in goal for Kamloops and Priestner doing the same for the home side.
The Cougars got two goals from veteran forward Parker Stanfield and singles from Bruin McDonald, Tyler Halliday and Rodgers.
JUST NOTES: The Torbohm trade is the first one made by Bonner that involves a 2011 draft pick. . . . Cumming is the son of Lorne Cumming, a well-known figure in Kamloops hockey circles who scouts for the Giants. . . . Prince George F Brett Connolly (hip) didn’t play Saturday, meaning he sat out all five exhibition games. The Cougars also were missing F Marek Viedensky, who had just returned from the San Jose Sharks’ camp. . . . The Cougars have released F Jordan Lane, the 20-year-old from Whitehorse who played last season with the QMJHL’s Moncton Wildcats. That leaves the Cougars with three 20-year-olds – D Dallas Jackson, F Tyler Halliday, who is from Kamloops, and Rodgers. . . . F Uriah Machuga, released last week by the Blazers, had a goal and three assists Saturday as his Spokane Braves beat the visiting Columbia Valley Rockies, 12-4. Machuga had one assist Sunday in an 8-0 victory over the visiting Grand Forks Bruins. After the opening weekend, the 17-year-old native of Norco, Calif., is one point off the KIJHL scoring lead.

gdrinnan@kamloopsnews.ca
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