Tigers embrace rebuild with flurry of moves to close 2021
By MEDICINE HAT NEWS on December 29, 2021.
The Medicine Hat Tigers were only getting started making moves with Monday’s Lukas Svejkovsky trade.
Tuesday afternoon the Tigers announced they had acquired two players in a three-way trade involving the Saskatoon Blades and Prince George Cougars.
In the deal, Medicine Hat received defenceman Pavel Bocharov and forward Brendan Lee from the Saskatoon Blades, as well as Prince George’s fifth round pick in 2025.
Bocharov, 17, has one goal and seven points in 30 games for the Blades this season. The 19-year-old Lee has five goals and 11 points in the same number of games in Saskatoon.
The Tigers moved defenseman Ryan Nolan and a 2023 fourth rounder to the Blades and forwards Cayden Glover and Carlin Dezainde and a 2023 second-round pick to the Cougars in the multi-team deal.
Dezainde appeared in 21 of the Tigers 28 games this season and had two assists. Glover had three goals and two assists in his 15 games and Nolan went pointless in eight contests.
Saskatoon also received forward Kyren Gronick from Prince George, who received in return from the Blades a third-round pick in 2023 and seventh-round pick in 2025.
The move came a little over 24 hours after the Tigers traded the top-line talent of Svejkovsky to the Seattle Thunderbirds for a trio of picks. Medicine Hat received the Thunderbirds’ first-round pick in 2022, as well as two conditional picks, a second-round pick in 2023 and a third-round pick in 2025.
The writing was on the wall for the Tigers to make some moves as they are only one win and three losses removed from a 16-game losing streak and sit last in the WHL with a record of 5-19-3-1 following Tuesday’s loss in Calgary.
Medicine Hat’s three-way trade was not their only off-ice action Tuesday. With an open over-age spot as a result of the Svejkovsky trade, the Tigers picked up 20-year-old forward Carter Chorney.
The Sherwood Park product spent the past four seasons in the WHL before joining the AJHL’s Sherwood Park Crusaders for the 2021-’22 campaign. In 21 games with the Crusaders this season Chorney had six goals and 18 points.
The veteran forward has 27 goals and 57 points in 181 WHL games for three WHL clubs. Chorney has respresented the Spokane Chiefs, Swift Current Broncos and most recently the Regina Pats.
Tigers head coach and general manager Willie Desjardins said in a press release Tuesday morning Chorney is a hard worker and the team is excited to bring him in and work with him.
“Carter has four years in the league and will help bring some experience to our forward group,” Desjardins said.
Chorney joined the Tigers for their Tuesday night contest in Calgary against the Hitmen alongside rookies Cru Hanas and Josh Van Mulligan who were called up to the WHL ahead of the three-team trade.
