Image Credit: CFJC Today/Kamloops Blazers

By Adam Donnelly

WHL TRADE DEADLINE

Kamloops Blazers deadline haul sets up huge potential for future success

Jan 11, 2024 | 5:45 PM

KAMLOOPS — The 2024 WHL Trade Deadline turned into a busy one for Kamloops Blazers Head Coach and General Manager Shaun Clouston, as he dealt a trio of veteran WHLers — Dylan Sydor to Lethbridge, Shea Van Olm to Spokane, and Connor Levis to the Vancouver Giants.

“There’s always a question of what the market is going to be like and that dictates the decision,” Clouston explains. “When there is as high of an interest in players as there was, there were some things that really made sense as we approached the deadline.”

In return, the Blazers received a pair of players — 17-year-old Cole Wadsworth from Spokane and 20-year-old Blake Swetlikoff from Lethbridge.

Clouston also replenished the draft pantry, adding two picks each for Sydor and Van Olm and getting three more from the Giants in return for Levis.

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“We feel really good about the results. The reality of where we’re at hits a little bit today, you know, with the roster,” Clouston says. “I think that it was hard to do, but the right thing to do, where we were at with our draft board after last season.”

Since November 19, the Blazes have added three players and 16 draft picks, including 12 in the first four rounds of the WHL Prospects Draft in 2024 and 2025. While these moves have the potential to be transformative for the hockey club down the road, it’s still not easy sending players to other teams.

“There’s some emotion involved. There’s some surprise in certain situations,” Clouston says. “But the three players we moved, they’re playing already. They’re on to their new teams. It’s an opportunity for them, and if players look at it the right way, it’s a positive.”

For a veteran guy like team captain Logan Bairos, seeing long-time teammates get moved to different teams can be tough.

“It’s always hard saying goodbye to the friends that you’ve made over the last three or four years here,” Bairos says. “I was lucky enough to say goodbye personally to each of them, give them a goodbye hug and wish them the best.”

With the deadline done and dusted, the players’ focus now has to shift to games remaining on the schedule, and continuing to work hard and getting better every day.

“We’ve still got a lot of players who have been here all year and are still working toward the same goal as a team,” Bairos says. “That’s our focus now — to get better every day, still win some hockey games down the stretch and try to compete as much as we can.”

With just nine wins through 38 games, results on the scoreboard might not be the best gauge of progress for this iteration of the Blazers.

Now that the whirlwind of deadline day has passed, Clouston believes the franchise is headed in a good direction with the picks he has at his disposal.

“We completely turned it from a situation where we’re maybe a bottom two or three team with the volume of draft picks,” Clouston says. “[Now] I think [we’re] in the best situation of any team in the league, moving forward with draft picks.”