NEWS PHOTO JAMES TUBB
Medicine Hat Tigers forward Dub Eunice III looks to make a pass with the puck in the first period of a 4-2 preseason win Sept. 6 at Co-op Place over the Lethbridge Hurricanes. Eunice is one of a few young, unsigned players left on the Tigers' preseason roster.
jtubb@medicinehatnews.com@ReporterTubb
A crowded ice surface at Co-op Place was a little clearer Tuesday.
The Medicine Hat Tigers preseason roster was trimmed after the 4-2 preseason win Sept. 6 at home over the Lethbridge Hurricanes. They reassigned 2009-born forwards Jaxson Craig and Owen Hayes to their respective clubs and released forwards Ben Deacon (2007), Sam Auld (2008) and Oliver Parent (2009) from their camp invites.
The move leaves the Tigers with 15 forwards on the roster, including four non-returning prospect forwards, camp invite Dub Eunice III (2008), Noah Davidson (2008), Brayden Ryan-MacKay (2008) and Luke Ruptash (2009), the club’s 2024 first-round pick. Dayton Reschny, a 19-year-old camp invite, also remains with the club.
“There’s spots on the team that they have to be fighting for,” head coach and general manager Willie Desjardins said. “We still have some young defence, we have D-men at (NHL) camps so we still have those young defencemen.
Ruptash has been limited since suffering an upper-body injury in a 7-4 preseason win on Sept. 2 in Lethbridge. Overage forward Ethan Neatens suffered a lower-body injury in Monday’s practice. Desjardins says Ruptash will be out a week or so and Neutens is still to be evaluated.
Neither are expected to play this weekend at the Yukon Showcase in Whitehorse where the Tigers will take on the Kelowna Rockets for a pair of preseason games. He says the trip will serve as a team builder for them but also has to be their opportunity to get ready for the season.
“You get to do a little team building when you’re away, can get guys together, so that part’s good for us,” Desjardins said. “But we’re going to have to be ready in those games. Kelowna is going to come and play hard, and they’re big games for them and big games for us.”
Desjardins says they will have some hockey clinics with the kids from Whitehorse and have an opportunity to see the city where former Tiger Gavin McKenna and Hurricanes’ alum Dylan Cozens came from. As much as he hopes the trip gets them set for the regular season, he hopes his team grows from the experience.
“Junior hockey is about growth and not just hockey, it’s about growth in lots of areas,” Desjardins said. “One of our goals is to try to turn out leaders. Part of leadership is experiencing different things, learning different things, so it’s going to be interesting going up there, they’ve turned out a couple good hockey players out of there, so I’m going to be excited just to see what they have and what the young guys are like up there.”
