WHL Brandon Wheat Kings

Trade Tree: Wheat Kings' Forward Depth Has Roots in Clague Deal

Published on May 1, 2024 under Western Hockey League (WHL)
Brandon Wheat Kings News Release


When teams trade away one of their top players, they can only hope the players they get in return lead them to higher heights and a new run of success. If the Brandon Wheat Kings enjoy a new run of success, they can trace it back to two trades in January of 2018.

On January 10 of that year, the same day they traded Tanner Kaspick in a blockbuster deal, the Wheat Kings made another massive move, shipping off a player who'd helped them to a championship in 2016 in the hopes that trade might one day open another championship window. The player they moved was Kale Clague, and the trading partner they found was their division rival, the Moose Jaw Warriors.

Clague had been a first-round pick, sixth overall, for the Wheat Kings in 2013, taken with a pick that (ironically) could be part of its own trade tree stemming back to the trade of Micheal Ferland. Over the course of 169 games in Black and Gold, Clague posted 143 points. He also played his way onto Team Canada at the World Juniors twice, winning a silver medal in 2017 and gold in 2018, and was drafted 51st overall by the Los Angeles Kings in 2016.

In other words, by the time he was on the trade block in 2018, Clague had pushed his value through the roof, and the Wheat Kings reaped the benefits.

THE TRADE: Moose Jaw Acquires: defenseman Kale Clauge

Brandon Acquires: defenseman Chase Hartje, forward Luka Burzan, 2018 second-round pick, 2019 first-round pick, 2021 first-round pick.

The Warriors brought in Clague to provide offense from the back end, and he came through for them on that front. He posted 24 points in 26 regular season games, then tacked on 14 points in 14 playoff games, but the Warriors bowed out in the second round to the eventual champion Swift Current Broncos. By the next season, Clague was a full-timer in the AHL with the Ontario Reign. His career has continued on, but his part in this trade ends here.

As for the Wheat Kings, not only did they hit on every one of the draft picks they acquired, they got some good hockey out of the players they picked up as well.

Luka Burzan

It didn't take Burzan long to fit right in with the Wheat Kings. He posted 21 points in 30 games for Brandon following the trade, and while that was a decent enough offensive output, the Surrey, BC native was just getting started.

In his second season, Burzan grew by a leap and a bound, putting up 40 goals and 78 points in 68 games. That performance got him drafted by the Colorado Avalanche that summer, and while he wasn't as prolific the next season, he still managed a noteworthy 35 goals and 62 points in 63 games.

After that season, Burzan turned pro with the Colorado Eagles during the COVID-shortened 2020-21 campaign. His branch of the trade tree wraps up there, as he was never traded by the Wheat Kings.

Chase Hartje

A native of Bemidji, Minnesota, Hartje was well-travelled in his 178-game WHL career. His tenure with the Wheat Kings consisted of a pair of half-seasons.

The first of these, following his acquisition from Moose Jaw, saw him put up eight points in 27 games, and a plus-3 rating. The next season, he added 12 points in 35 games, and finished with an even better rating of plus-11. But with the Wheat Kings still needing to look to the future (they would miss the playoffs in 2019), they added Hartje for a piece to help themselves down the road.

On January 10, 2019, one year removed from the Clague and Kaspick trades, the Wheat Kings flipped Hartje to the Kootenay ICE in exchange for a third round pick in the 2019 draft. The ICE themselves would end up flipping Hartje to, ironically, the Moose Jaw Warriors the following season.

The pick the Wheat Kings nabbed in the trade ended up being 53rd overall, and came on the heels of another Wheat Kings' pick at 52nd overall (which they used on Jessiah Bennett). At 53rd overall, the Wheat Kings selected blueliner Owen Harris.

Harris, a Wawanesa product playing for the Southwest Cougars at the time, would go on to play 66 games over parts of two seasons with the Wheat Kings. But midway through the 2022-23 season, he returned to the MJHL's Swan Valley Stampeders and finished out the season there. He was never traded, so he is the last piece of this longest branch of the trade.

The other branches of the trade are simpler, but extremely effective.

2018 Second-Round Pick

This pick was not originally the property of the Moose Jaw Warriors. It had previously belonged to the Prince George Cougars, from whom the Warriors had acquired it in 2017, and that left the pick much higher up in the draft order at 24th overall, where the Wheat Kings would strike gold.

With that pick, the Wheat Kings selected a player who would go on to be a future captain, leading scorer, and power-forward: Brett Hyland. After he made his debut in the bubble season in 2021, Hyland steadily moved up the Wheat Kings' depth chart. He put up 26 goals and 47 points in 42 games before injury struck in 2022-23, and that was enough to get him drafted by the Washington Capitals.

In 2023-24, after the trade of Nate Danielson, Hyland was named the Wheat Kings captain. He broke the 30-goal barrier for the first time, led the team in scoring, and finished his junior career as a Wheat King. With his hockey journey now leading him elsewhere, Hyland is the only part of this branch of the trade tree.

2019 First-Round Pick

As this pick belonged to Moose Jaw originally, it was a little further down the draft order but still high enough for the Wheat Kings to grab a player that not only still plays for them but was among their leading scorers last season.

Rylen Roersma was the selection, 16th overall, that stemmed from this trade. Like Hyland, he debuted in the bubble season in Regina in 2021, then began to build on his offensive totals year by year in the seasons since. He scored 19 goals in each of his first two seasons after 2021, but added more assists in 2022-23 to get up to 36 points.

Most recently, Roersma was the Wheat Kings' second leading scorer in 2023-24 with 58 points in 64 games. He also hit 20 goals for the first time in his career, and added two goals and two assists in four playoff games.

Born in 2004, Roersma is eligible to return to the Wheat Kings next season as a 20-year-old and finish his WHL career with the franchise that drafted him. He's played 214 WHL games, all with the Wheat Kings, and since he has not been traded, his branch of the trade tree is short and sweet.

2021 First-Round Pick

The final branch of this tree for the Wheat Kings has yet to fully play out, yet it shows potential to be the most impressive one yet. But even though it could be the most important piece of the trade, it's also perhaps the simplest so far.

The 2021 first-round pick the Wheat Kings scooped up in this deal turned out to be 4th overall, just one selection after the pick the Wheat Kings had acquired from the Victoria Royals that they used on Charlie Elick. Having bolstered the future of their blueline, the Wheat Kings turned their attention to the forward corps, selecting Saskatoon native Roger McQueen.

A player drafted that high is inevitably going to have expectations on him, and early signs point to McQueen being just what the Wheat Kings expected. Though he struggled a bit in his first season with 14 points in 55 games, the signs of his high ceiling were there, especially when he posted eight points in six games for Canada at the U18s.

Before the 2023-24 season began, McQueen's seven points in five games helped Canada to gold at the Hlinka Gretzky Cup and he carried that momentum into the season. Not only did he easily outdo his previous year with 51 points in 53 games, he led the Wheat Kings in goals in the playoffs with four goals in four games.

As a later birthday (McQueen was born on October 2 of 2006) he won't be eligible for the NHL draft until the summer of 2025, so the Wheat Kings know they've got at least another year before the professional ranks beckon. So McQueen's branch of the trade tree ends on a hopeful note for the future.

In the span of two trades, the Wheat Kings added a pair of first-round picks that they hope will open a new window of contention for them for years to come. More than that, they added numerous players who wore the Black and Gold for hundreds of games and helped bring the team some of its brightest moments over the past few seasons.

This trade and the trade of Tanner Kaspick are proof that while trading a big star is never easy, it doesn't have to be painful in the long run.

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Western Hockey League Stories from May 1, 2024


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