Medicine Hat Tigers captain Oasiz Wiesblatt stands at centre ice ahead of puck drop for the Tigers' 3-1 round-robin win Tuesday over the London Knights at the 2025 Memorial Cup in Rimouski.--NEWS PHOTO JAMES TUBB
jtubb@medicinehatnews.com@ReporterTubb
RIMOUSKI, QUE.
With 314 career regular season and playoff games in the Medicine Hat Tigers orange and black, Oasiz Wiesblatt has one more opportunity to represent the city he’s grown to love.
“It’s really exciting, obviously it’s tough not being a Tiger after this one, but it’s really exciting,” Wiesblatt said Friday. “This group can do special things and we’re not done yet. We have a chance to be in the history books, but to be honest, we’re not really focused on that. It’s more focused on playing Tigers hockey.”
When looking at regular season and playoff numbers, his 311 career games rank 21st in Tigers’ history, his 205 assists 11th and his 322 points are 12th. He says the logo holds a special place in his heart and he continues to hope he can leave his No. 7 in a good place.
“This city has done a lot for me, and the coaches have done a lot for me, and I’ve changed as a person,” Wiesblatt said. “I can’t thank enough for the fans and all their support, and even the school system helping me out and just sticking with it. You know, this logo is extremely special and it’s hard for me to kind of describe right now.”
Wiesblatt says he hasn’t talked with the Tigers’ other overagers, forward Mat Ward and goaltender Harrison Meneghin, about this being their final game of the season. The Tigers’ other players sure know what this game means to their captain, looking to help him end his junior career on the highest note with a Memorial Cup championship.
“He’s done a lot for this city and Medicine Hat, so we want to do it for him,” forward Gavin Mckenna said. “He’s put his heart and soul into the organization, he’s changed the culture and he’s one of the best captains I’ve ever seen. So he’s guided me pretty well, I’ve got to play with him my whole career. So want to do it for him, because he’s done a lot for me.”
The Calgary product was part of the Tigers’ 11-win season in 2021-22, the last full-time member of that team on the WHL championship roster. He says he wouldn’t have changed a thing about that team and what they had to get through to get to this point. McKenna, forward Andrew Basha and other players all season have credited Wiesblatt for the culture shift from that losing team to a championship-calibre group.
It’s an acknowledgement he wouldn’t fully accept.
“I feel like just a hard-working team, you’ve got the skill, there’s a lot of skilled players in this league, and the difference is how bad you want it,” Wiesblatt said. “I wouldn’t give myself the credit. I would give Willie (Desjardins) and the coaching staff and all the players (credit), too.”
Before his final junior hockey game and he makes the jump to pro hockey with the Milwaukee Admirals of the American Hockey League next season, Wiesblatt has some rituals to follow. Ahead of the Memorial Cup finals, against either the London Knights or Moncton Wildcats, Wiesblatt will lead the team through warmups.
Dishing out pucks to shoot on the net and finally, juggling a puck with Basha, his longest friend on the team. For the 19-year-old Basha, who played alongside Wiesblatt for his first two years in the league and has been his running mate ever since, it’ll be a chance to juggle a puck and play alongside his friend for old time’s sake.
“He’s my best friend here, he has been for five years, so it’ll be great to have one last time out there together on the same team, maybe ever,” Basha said. “So it’s been unbelievable to get to share all these moments with him. All the guys are all so close, but definitely it’ll be a fun last in warm-up, to go through all of our rituals together and all that. It’ll be fun to do them one last time.”
