Wheat Kings a great fit for veteran scout

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This article was published 31/08/2019 (2456 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

When Doug Gasper was looking for a job a little closer to home, he decided the Brandon Wheat Kings simply had too much to offer for him to ignore.

The 55-year-old was named the club’s assistant general manager and director of scouting in mid-August. He said it was an easy decision.

“Brandon has been such a model franchise in the Western Hockey League,” Gasper said. “(Owner) Kelly (McCrimmon) has run such a great program. It has such a great reputation. The chance to learn from him and (general manager) Darren Ritchie and the whole hockey operations — you have (head coach) Dave Lowry and all these people here — it was just a perfect scenario. I believe we have a good team with a strong group of prospects coming up and a lot of draft picks as well.”

Gasper suggested that one of the most underrated things in a hockey job is having great people to work with, and he feels he’s found that in Brandon.

Ritchie said it was a great addition for him personally as he adjusts to his new job as GM.

“It’s real important,” Ritchie said. “We get along well. We understand what we want, we’ve had great conversations during the process and now since we’re sitting down face-to-face we have a clear idea of what we want to do and what we want to look like. He’s an easy guy to have a conversation with. I always enjoy being around the guy.”

Gasper played hockey when he was a younger, but got into higher levels of coaching as he pursued his career as a teacher and school administrator in Saskatchewan and Alberta.

“I wanted to be involved in the game and didn’t see myself going down the coaching route,” Gasper said. “I really enjoyed the scouting part of it so it turned me into that area.”

His education career and scouting dealt with the same age group, so he found they dovetailed nicely into each other.

Gasper got his first shot with the Prince Albert Raiders, spending two season there. Many WHL teams allow scouts to also serve as bird dogs for Tier 2 teams as well, so he also worked with the Nipawin Hawks of the Saskatchewan Junior Hockey League.

He began helping Hawks head coach Doug Johnson as they turned the program around into a perennial contender.

Gasper joined the Moose Jaw Warriors in 2007 when his youngest son Troy was playing midget hockey there, and Gasper was promoted to assistant head scout in 2012. After two seasons as director of scouting, he joined the National Hockey League’s Vancouver Canucks in 2017 as they sought someone in the WHL’s Eastern Conference.

“I wasn’t really looking to leave Moose Jaw,” Gasper said. “It was a great place to work. (General manager) Alan Millar spent a lot of time with me and taught me a lot of things so I really enjoyed my time there but these opportunities pop up when they pop up and you either take them or who knows when the next one comes along.”

Gasper said there is a massive difference between scouting 14- or 15-year-old bantam draft prospects and 17-or 18-year-old NHL prospects.

“We jokingly say that at 14 we’re not even sure if they want to be hockey players,” Gasper said. “They’re so young and still growing and maturing. You see a lot of them that have a love for the game and that’s what we’re looking for, the guys who compete and love it. You have to do a lot more homework and background checks on players, talking to coaches, talking to schools to see what kind of young men they are.”

He noted that in the NHL draft, the motivation and drive are usually proven by their tenure in junior hockey.

He added that an NHL scout might be looking at a total of 20-30 players by the end of the season, while WHL scouts are compiling reports on as many as they can.

“With (owner) Kelly (McCrimmon) and (general manager) Darren (Ritchie), we’re not here to recreate the Western Hockey League draft and the order it’s going in,” Gasper said. “We’re specifically looking for players who we think fit the Brandon Wheat Kings mold. Our list will be scaled right down to who we think are going to be great Wheat Kings, not just great players in the Western Hockey League.”

This comes as the game undergoes its biggest change in decades, with a new focus on speed and skill over toughness and size. Goalies are bigger, forwards are smaller and defencemen must handle the puck efficiently.

Gasper said every team has fundamental pillars that outline the way the organization wants the team built. He noted an example is how hockey IQ has become extremely important because of the speed the game is now played at.

“The game has really opened up for the very skilled, smaller player,” Gasper said. “Guys who we used to say were too small to play in the Western Hockey League are now guys who you’re looking at.”

He will certainly have a good group of bantam prospects to watch. The 2005-born class, which will be drafted next spring, has had scouts excited for a couple of years.

“Talking to our scouts, they’re all excited about the 2005 group across Western Canada,” Gasper said. “Any time you get depth like that and you’re still picking in that fourth for fifth round and getting really good players, that just makes the year.”

He joked that in his time as a WHL scout, he hadn’t made a family Thanksgiving meal in years because bantam tournaments are invariably on long weekends.

With the entire scouting staff in Brandon to watch training camp, it’s a chance for the group to hammer out what it’s looking for in future players. Gasper said that shared vision is key.

“Right from the top, it goes through our entire organization,” Gasper said. “It’s how we want to play. What do we see as the Brandon Wheat Kings? How do we want to play the game? After you decide how you’re going to play, then it’s breaking down those characteristics and traits and pillars that all those players need to bring to the table.

“For us as a scouting organization, we need to make sure that we get the players who fit that mold. Bringing a square peg to a round hole isn’t going to do us any good.”

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