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View Full Version : Looking local: Draft procedure makes it tough for WHL teams to bring in local talent



Billy Blade
09-06-2005, 06:55 PM
Source: http://www.canada.com/saskatoon/starphoenix/news/sports/blades/story.html?id=29fcbf17-0ccc-42d5-8514-f412aede70d1

Doug McConachie
The StarPhoenix

Friday, September 02, 2005

When 80 Blades hopefuls hit the ice in Martensville Thursday morning, there was one Saskatoon 15-year-old -- 5-foot-11 centre Gaelan Patterson -- up from the Saskatoon Raiders.
The year before there were two: Dustin Cameron and Curtis Willoughby. Cameron, after 16 goals and 21 assists with the AAA midget Saskatoon Contacts, has a shot at making the team this year. Willoughby has been dropped from the Blades' protected list.

To some fans, the Saskatoon content just isn't there. When things are going wrong, as they have been off and on over the past half-dozen years, the problem, according to the armchair experts, is that there aren't enough Saskatoon boys.

Anyone who understands the bantam draft system today also understands why that happens, Blades coach-GM Lorne Molleken explains. "We don't have control anymore."

Any of the 19 WHL teams can pluck a kid right out of your own backyard. Even if there's a player you want, he can be long gone before you get to pick, according to Molleken. Years ago, teams had a protected 'area,' that included their home territory, but that's been long done away with.

Now you have to wait your turn. If there's a player in Winnipeg or Edmonton or Vancouver who you think is a better player, that's the player you choose.

Over the past two years, the Blades actually had three out of the 25 Saskatoon kids picked. All things considered, that's not as bad record as it seems.

But this year the Blades are going one step further in searching for local talent.

They have invited 15 other players from Saskatoon's minor hockey ranks to training camp which opened Thursday in Martensville. The thinking is that one or two talented players might have been overlooked.

There's a lot of talent in Saskatoon, Molleken says, "which is a tribute to the program and the coaches. I had a chance to watch a lot of bantam games last year and all these kids (we've invited) are very capable players. Sure, we'd have loved to have (many of the other Saskatoon players who were drafted,) but some were long gone before we had our chance."

It's not about charity that these kids got letters of invites, nor was it that the Blades needed cannon fodder for the kids they did draft this past summer. "We were very selective on who we invited," says Molleken.

The Kelowna Rockets had 220 players at their rookie camp a week ago. The Blades couldn't see the merits of such a huge field. The best have already been drafted. But there are many late bloomers and to get an edge up on other teams, you go back and give them second looks.

At the 2004 training camp, Sam Klassen of Watrous was 5-foot-9. He captured some attention because of obvious skills, but his size worked against him -- just as it did 50 or 60 other kids

Most of those 'unremarkables' from a season ago aren't back for a second look, but Klassen grew to 6-foot-1. "They all develop at different rates," Blades' chief scout Paul Olekszyk says. A player who has talent like Klassen deserves a second look.

And when Blades' scouts went back through their notes, they found another 20 players from the province who were ignored in the bantam draft who deserved a second look-see.

CAMPING OUT: With only 13 defencemen invited to main camp which starts Monday -- and with two of those (Evan Haw and Dalyn Flatt) going to NHL camps for the first two weeks of September -- expect the Blades to give at least a couple of rookies an invite to main camp even though they're ineligible to play this year in the WHL. Teigan Zahn of Bethune, the Blades' first pick this summer, will likely be one. Spencer Lockert of Abbotsford, the Blades 6-foot-7 sixth-round pick and the tallest player in camp, who handled the puck very well and skated solidly for his size, could be another. Both will be going home after camp to play AAA midget.

http://a123.g.akamai.net/f/123/12465/1d/media.canada.com/idl/sasp/20050902/47722-15154.jpg
CREDIT: Richard Marjan, The StarPhoenix
Blades' hopefuls scrimmage at Martensville Arena