Showing posts with label Brandon Schuldaus. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Brandon Schuldaus. Show all posts

Friday, December 30, 2016

Swift Current does it up right ... T-Birds, Rebels swap defencemen ... Two WHLers get NHL deals


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A lot of emotion was on display Friday morning as a memorial was unveiled in honour of four players who were killed when the Swift Current Broncos’ bus crashed while en route to Regina for a game with the Pats on Dec. 30, 1986.
The monument features the smiling faces of Trent Kresse, Scott Kruger, Chris Mantyka and Brent Ruff.
Family members were present for the unveiling, as were this season’s Broncos, some survivors of the crash and various dignitaries.
“Every Christmas it seems like, it’s ‘there,’ ” Don Mantyka, Chris’s father, told Candace Woodside of the Southwest Booster. “As much as you want to spend Christmas with your family . . . it’s that presence still there. It’s an anniversary each and every year. It doesn’t go away. You think that sometimes it’s supposed to live its life out, but it doesn’t . . . the 20th anniversary was up, now the 30th . . . and it keeps coming up. And I appreciate it because the boys haven’t been forgotten.
“With Bill (Lee), the tremendous job he's done, you can’t even explain, from our point of view, what it means, what this man has done. It’s tremendous.”
Lee, who is from Swift Current, was the push behind getting the memorial built.
Woodside’s story is right here.
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F Jesse Schultz (Tri-City, Prince Albert, Kelowna, 1999-2003) has been released by the Sheffield Steelers (England, UK Elite). He had eight goals and 11 assists in 23 games. . . . 
D Brett Festerling (Tri-City, Vancouver, 2001-07) has signed a three-year extension with the Nuremberg Ice Tigers (Germany, DEL). This season, he has a goal and 10 assists in 31 games.
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With some time on his hands over Christmas week, The MacBeth Report did some research and came up with this:
“Elliotte Friedman's research shows that since 2005-06, only six NHL teams four or more points out of the playoffs on Nov. 1 have gone on to make the playoffs. I have always wondered if it would apply to the WHL. After wading through the schedules on the WHL website . . .
“Beginning with the 2005-06 WHL season (11 seasons), only eight teams that were four or more points out of a playoff spot on the morning of Nov. 1 actually made the playoffs. The most recent was last season. The Edmonton Oil Kings made the playoffs after being four points out on Nov. 1 and they needed a victory in a one-game tiebreaker to do it.
“There was one season (2006-07) when the 16 teams in a playoff spot on Nov. 1 all made the playoffs.
“On average, slightly more than two teams (2.2 average) out of a playoff spot by any margin on the morning of Nov. 1 finish in the playoffs at the end of a season.
“This season, on the morning of Nov. 1, three teams in the Eastern Conference (Edmonton, Kootenay Ice, Prince Albert Raiders) and one team in the Western Conference (Seattle Thunderbirds) were four or more points out of a playoff spot. Right now, Edmonton is in the first wild-card spot in the East and Seattle is in possession of the second wild-card in the West.”
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The Seattle Thunderbirds have acquired D Austin Strand, 19, and a sixth-round selection in the 2019
AUSTIN STRAND
bantam draft from the Red Deer Rebels in exchange for D Brandon Schuldaus, 18.
Schuldaus didn’t return to the Thunderbirds after the Christmas break and requested a trade.
BRANDON SCHULDAUS
Strand, 6-foot-3 and 190 pounds, has a goal and four assists in 38 games with Red Deer this season. In 163 career games, he recorded seven goals and 34 assists. From Calgary, he was a third-round pick by the Rebels in the 2012 bantam draft.
Schuldaus, a native of Houston, Texas, who now calls Calgary home, had two goals and three assists in 33 games with Seattle this season. In 90 games over two seasons, he had four goals and seven assists. He was a fifth-round pick by the Thunderbirds in the 2013 bantam draft. The 6-foot-3, 205-pound Schuldaus played bantam in Airdrie, Alta., and midget at Shattuck St. Mary’s.
Schuldaus was in Calgary when he was informed of the trade, so was able to get to Red Deer in time to play last night against the visiting Kootenay Ice.
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The Columbus Blue Jackets have signed F Calvin Thurkauf to a three-year, entry-level NHL contract. Thurkauf is playing in the World Junior Championship at the moment; he is captain of Switzerland’s national junior team, although he sat out Thursday’s 5-4 shootout victory over Denmark in Montreal thanks to a one-game suspension for slew-footing an opponent. . . . From Zug, the 6-foot-2, 200-pound Thurkauf was a seventh-round pick in the NHL’s 2016 draft. . . . With the Rockets, he has 31 points, 17 of them goals, in 28 games. Last season, as a freshman, he put up 45 points, including 18 goals, in 61 games.
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The Edmonton Oilers have signed F Tyler Benson of the Vancouver Giants to a three-year, entry-level contract. The 6-foot-0, 200-pound Benson, who is from Edmonton, was a second-round selection in the 2016 NHL draft. . . . This season, he has 10 goals and 30 assists in 31 games with the Giants. He lost a lot of the 2015-16 season to health issues, finishing with 28 points, including nine goals, in 30 games. In 130 career regular-season games, he has 33 goals and 80 assists. . . . The Giants selected him with the first overall pick in the WHL’s 2013 bantam draft.
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D Bryan Allbee has joined the BCHL’s Prince George Spruce Kings. Allbee, 19, is from Prince George. He was released earlier in the week by the Seattle Thunderbirds. . . . He had three assists in 33 games with Seattle this season. He also has played in the WHL with the Kootenay Ice. In 146 career regular-season games, the 6-foot-0, 180-pounder has 11 goals and 17 assists.

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Posted by Gregg Drinnan at 6:54 PM
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Tuesday, December 27, 2016

Blazers, Pats swing deal . . . Thunderbirds making changes . . . Cougars add coach

F Aki Kangasmäki (Chilliwack, 2006-07) has been loaned by KeuPa HT Keuruu (Finland, Mestis) to Lukko Rauma (Finland, Liiga). He started the season with Hokki Kajaani (Finland, Mestis), scoring three goals and adding three assists in nine games, before signing with KeuPa on Nov. 24. He had eight goals and seven assists in 12 games there. . . .
D Shaone Morrisonn (Kamloops, 1999-2002) has been traded by Medveščak Zagreb (Croatia, KHL) to Admiral Vladivostok (Russia, KHL) for cash compensation. Morrisonn had two goals and four assists in 33 games with Medveščak. The deal was completed on Christmas Day, which was the trade deadline in the KHL this season.
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The Kamloops Blazers had an extra defenceman and badly needed to add a veteran centre. The Regina Pats had extra forwards and wanted another defenceman. So the Blazers dealt D Dawson Davidson, 18, to the Pats for F Luc Smith, 18.
The trade was announced on Tuesday morning, although Davidson was told about it on Christmas night.
The Blazers will be without F Matt Revel, 20, for perhaps two months after he suffered an undisclosed injury during a game against the host Edmonton Oil Kings on Dec. 10. Revel, a veteran centre, was a key part of the Blazers, who are hoping that Smith is able to at least help make up for the absence.
The 6-foot-5, 205-pound Smith has six goals and five assists in 29 games with the Pats this season. In 154 career games, all with Regina, the native of Stony Plain, Alta., has 12 goals and 14 assists.
DAWSON DAVIDSON
Davidson, from Moosomin, Sask., is a puck-moving defenceman who should fit in well with the Pats’ high-powered offence. The 5-foot-11, 180-pounder has three goals and 12 assists in 32 games this season. In 124 regular-season games, he had 12 goals and 51 assists. Last season, he finished with six goals and 33 assists in 59 games.
LUC SMITH
Davidson told Greg Harder of the Regina Leader-Post that he is excited about joining a contender — the Pats went into last night at 22-3-6 — and a team that is in the running to be the host team for the 2018 Memorial Cup tournament.
“That’s why coming here is so special,” Davidson told Harder. “The Pats are very dangerous this year and, next year, if we can get the Memorial Cup that would be awesome. It’s an unbelievable opportunity.”
Interestingly, Davidson and Smith were both third-round selections in the 2013 bantam draft; in fact, they were taken two picks apart.
The Pats added Davidson almost a month after getting D Jonathan Smart, 17, from the Kelowna Rockets. Smart went into last night’s game with seven assists in eight games with Regina.
Kamloops also has brought in F Brodi Stuart from the Fraser Valley Thunderbirds of the B.C. Major Midget Hockey League. He has nine goals and 11 assists in 19 games with the Thunderbirds. He was pointless in two earlier games with the Blazers this season.
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The Spokane Chiefs have add F Alex Mowbray, 20, to their rsoter. Mowbray, who is from Calgary, had been playing with the AJHL’s Camrose Kodiaks, In 32 games, he had 10 goals and 10 assists. . . . Mowbray had played the previous three season with the Medicine Hat Tigers, putting up 22 goals and 20 assists in 177 games. Medicine Hat selected him in the fourth round of the 2011 bantam draft. . . . He joins G Jayden Sittler and F Keanu Yamamoto as Spokane’s three 20-year-olds.
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The Seattle Thunderbirds have acquired D Aaron Hyman, 18, from the Calgary Hitmen for a third-round selection in the 2018 bantam draft. The 6-foot-5, 215-pound Hyman has a goal and seven assists in 28
AARON HYMAN
games this season. In 74 career regular-season games, he has two goals and 10 assists. The Thunderbirds, who lost a lot of size from their back end after last season with the departures of Jared Hauf and Jerret Smith, wanted to add some size and they have done that. . . . Calgary had been carrying nine defencemen, so something had to give. . . . The Hitmen selected Hyman in the third-round of the 2013 WHL bantam draft, using a pick acquired from Seattle for G Brandon Glover in 2012.
Meanwhile, the Thunderbirds have dropped D Bryan Allbee, 19, and F Layne Bensmiller, 19, from their roster, and are looking to trade D Brandon Schuldaus, who has asked out.
Allbee, from Prince George, was being used both on defence and as a fourth-line forward. This season, he had three assists in 33 games. In 146 career games, the first 88 with the Kootenay Ice, he had 11 goals and 28 assists. Seattle acquired Allbee from Kootenay on Jan. 4 for a fifth-round selection in the 2017 bantam draft.
“Allbee wants to play more and knows he won’t in our league so he is going to play in (junior A),” Seattle general manager Russ Farwell told Andy Eide of 710 ESPN Seattle.
Bensmiller, from Red Deer, was limited to seven games by an undisclosed injury. In 119 career games, he has 18 goals and 24 assists. He also has played with the Hitmen and Prince Albert Raiders. Seattle acquired Bensmiller and a conditional seventh-round 2017 draft pick from Prince Albert on Sept. 15, with F Nic Holowko going the other way.
Schuldaus, a fifth-round pick in the 2013 bantam draft, has two goals and three assists in 33 games this season. Last season, as a freshman, the 6-foot-4, 195-pound Calgary native had two goals and four assists in 57 games.
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The Victoria Royals have signed G Riley Mathieson, 19, to a WHL contract. Mathieson is playing for the junior B Saanich Braves of the Vancouver Island Junior Hockey League and will remain there. The 6-foot-3, 210-pound Mathieson, who is from Port Hardy, B.C., will join the Royals, according to general manager Cam Hope, “on an as-needed basis.” . . . With the Braves, who are 21-9-1, Mathieson is 3.25, .902.
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Coaching
The Prince George Cougars have added Shawn Chambers, a two-time Stanley Cup winner as a player, to their staff as an assistant coach. A defenceman, Chambers played 625 regular-season and 94 playoff games in the NHL over 13 seasons. He won Stanley Cups with the New Jersey Devils (1995) and Dallas Stars (1999). He and Cougars head coach Richard Matvichuk were teammates in Dallas. . . . In Prince George, Chambers, a native of Sterling Heights, Mich., will work alongside Matvichuk and assistant coach Steve O’Rourke. . . . Chambers played 28 games with the Seattle Thunderbirds in 1986-87, after leaving the U of Alaska-Fairbanks. . . . He retired after playing four games with Dallas in 1999-2000.
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Posted by Gregg Drinnan at 10:12 PM
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