Top prospect Jim set to make WHL debut

With the team’s oldest defenceman on the shelf this weekend, the Brandon Wheat Kings have turned to the future for a pair of weekend matchups.

The Western Hockey League club has called up their most recent first-round pick, dynamic 15-year-old defenceman Cruz Jim of Grande Prairie, Alta.

Brandon head coach and general manager Marty Murray is doing his best to guard against heightened expectations for the young blue-liner but added Jim is a special player.

“He’s 15, so you have to keep it in reality,” Murray said. “At the same time, we think he can be a guy who can come here and help us. In pre-season in the two games he played, he was arguably our best defenceman. He’s so smart and very talented with the puck.

“We just want him to come in and play his game. I think he’s going to have a strong weekend for us.”

Brandon will be missing overage defenceman Grayson Burzynski after he earned a two-game suspension for an ill-conceived high hit on Prince Albert Raiders forward Riley Boychuk on Saturday that landed him a cross-checking major and game misconduct.

Jim was in a language arts class on Tuesday when he received a text from Murray asking if they could chat. When they talked shortly after, Murray asked if he could come up for the weekend.

“It was pretty sweet,” Jim said after practice on Friday. “It’s awesome here in Brandon, and it’s good to be here. I’m excited.”

The Wheat Kings (0-2-1-0) meet the Edmonton Oil Kings (3-1-0-0) on Saturday evening at 6 and then host the Saskatoon Blades (2-2-0-0) on Sunday afternoon at 4 as they play seven of their first eight games at Assiniboine Credit Union Place. Edmonton and Saskatoon both play on Friday, with the Oil Kings visiting the Moose Jaw Warriors and the Blades hosting the Red Deer Rebels.

After being reassigned by Brandon, Cruz made the jump to the Northern Alberta Xtreme under-18 prep team, where he’ll play this season with a pair of high-end Wheat Kings forward prospects, Ahmad Fayad and Levi Ellingsen. Their season begins on Sunday.

Jim, who was back in Brandon on Wednesday and practised on Thursday and Friday, said there is no mistaking that he’s skating against major players again.

“It’s just the pace,” Jim said. “It’s super fast, and there is so much attention to detail. As you go up in levels, it gets faster, and then the details get more important.”

Brandon also had another newcomer on the ice this week after towering Czech netminder Filip Ruzicka finally arrived in the city on Monday and practised for the first time the next day. His transfer had been denied by his Czech club and was finally sorted out last week.

“The situation was really long and stressful and depressing,” Ruzicka said after practice on Friday. “I’m real happy to be here with the guys and the coaches.”

While the first impression has been positive, he has noticed a difference in the style of play that he’ll need to adapt to quickly.

“It’s really good,” Ruzicka said. “It’s different in Europe because the rink is smaller than in Europe, and the players have more powerful shots.”

When the six-foot-seven, 230-pound Ruzicka stands in the crease, the crossbar is below the middle of his back. When the 17-year-old netminder is down in the butterfly, his long legs cover a lot of real estate.

Murray’s impression was similar.

“He’s massive and there’s a lot less net to shoot at as opposed to most goalies,” Murray said. “The first couple of viewings have been solid. Just talking to him today, I know it’s a change with the size of the ice, and from a goalie’s standpoint, it kind of messes with the angles. Probably guys shoot it a lot more here too, so he’ll get used to that, and when he gets a few more practices under his belt it will be beneficial for him and us.”

Murray is going to be patient with Ruzicka, especially with veteran soon-to-be-19-year-old starter Jayden Kraus and 18-year-old backup Hudson Perry also in the fold.

That patience may also come from how long it took to simply get the teenager here.

“It was a long process,” Murray said. “It took a long time getting his transfer. We stuck with it, and his agent was able to get it done. In a perfect world, it would have been nice to have it sorted out in early September but it’s out of everybody’s control. We’ll carry three goalies for a while and see how it shakes out.”

The weekend will provide Brandon’s first look at a Central Division opponent this season. Last season, Brandon won all four meetings with Edmonton, and they haven’t lost the season series since the 2021-22 campaign.

Saskatoon, meanwhile, has been a perennial thorn in the Wheat Kings’ side, going 19-8-2-1 against Brandon in the last five years and an incredible 11-2-1-1 at Assiniboine Credit Union Place in that span.

“We have two really good teams coming in, no question about it, so we’ll have to be at our best,” Murray said. “I think there have been glimpses, especially in the last game. We played pretty good for the most part, but penalties hurt us in the third period. I think we made some strides in defending our own net, but we played too much short-handed time in the third period.

“We’re going to have continue working at it, and it will be a challenge this weekend, especially without Burzynski, who was suspended. We’ll need all hands on deck.”

Brandon had to kill a major and two minor penalties in the third period, with Prince Albert tying the game on the power play with just over two minutes remaining. They then lost the game in overtime on what the team considered a pair of outrageous non-calls that led to the winning goal.

As a result of that and an opening weekend sweep by the Moose Jaw Warriors, the Wheat Kings head into the weekend still looking for their first victory. While they are scoring in bundles — they have 15 goals in three games — protecting their own net has been a work in progress. They’ve allowed 122 shots and 20 goals already this season. Murray said too many of the shots against are self-inflicted.

“We watched some video on how our shots are coming, and a lot of times we have complete control of the puck,” Murray said. “It’s the execution piece, we don’t make or receive a pass, and the next thing you know, the puck is in our end. It’s the simplest of things we need to clean up, and if we do that, we probably go from giving up 40 shots to giving up 30 shots real quick.”

One of those players who will need to be good is the five-foot-eight, 159-pound youngster Jim, who is mindful he’ll have to be smart with his decisions as he makes his regular season debut.

“I try to play my game,” Jim said. “It’s probably going to be a simpler game, and as I get older and the guys get better and the checking gets tighter, you just have to make sure you’re managing the puck well.”

ICINGS: Prince Albert traded overage forward Harrison Lodewyk of Red Deer to the Calgary Hitmen on Thursday for a third-round pick in 2027 and a fifth-round pick in 2028 to get down to the league limit of three 20-year-old players. They made the deal after defenceman Justice Christensen was returned by the Detroit Red Wings, with forwards Aiden Oiring and Brayden Dube also taking up overage spots … More captains have been named around the league, including overage defenceman Bauer Dumanski of the Prince George Cougars and overage forward Talon Brigley of the Red Deer Rebels.

» pbergson@brandonsun.com