Giant Moves

The Vancouver Giants made what some consider drastic moves dealing three players to the Calgary Hitmen in return for two.

The dilemma was simple, they had to make changes and carrying three “tenders” simply wasn’t in the cards.

The pair they acquired was Ben Thomas (defenseman 1996) and Chase Lang (forward 1996) in exchange for overage forward Jackson Houck (forward), Jakob Stukel (winger 1997) and goaltender Cody Porter (1997) plus a conditional third round pick in the 2017 WHL Bantam Draft.

Giants Executive Vice President and General Manager Scott Bonner stated “In acquiring Ben and Chase, we’ve added a couple of NHL drafted players to our roster and both have had some good playoff experience in our league.”

He continued “We expect that they’ll be a great fit with our club and we would also like to wish Jackson, Jakob and Cody all the best with Calgary and thank them for their time with our organization.”

Thomas (19) a Calgary native and a blue liner was selected in the fourth round of the 2014 NHL Draft by the Tampa Bay Lightning at 119th overall.

To date he has three assists in 14 games (this season) along with 10 penalty minutes, while last year he picked up 31 points in 60 regular season games.

He has also posted 10 points in 24 career playoff games.

Lang (19) is from Nanaimo and has two goals and five assists (14 games) with the Hitmen this season.

He was drafted by the Minnesota Wild in the sixth round of the 2014 NHL Draft at 167th overall.

Last season he managed 25 goals and 31 assists in 56 games while adding seven points in 10 playoff games with the Hitmen.

Houck from North Vancouver dressed in 268 games for the Giants over his WHL career and was a third round pick of the G-Men in the 2010 Bantam Draft, going 57th overall.

Houck was drafted by the Oilers in the fourth round of the 2013 NHL Draft – 94th overall.

Currently he is now a free agent after the club elected not to sign him and so far this season he has four goals and five assists in 12 games.

Stukel (18) was drafted by the Giants in the second round of the 2012 WHL Bantam Draft at 37th overall.

He calls Surrey home and grabbed 16 points in 49 games in his rookie WHL season and to date has posted two goals and two assists in 12 games this year.

Porter from North Vancouver was signed as a free agent (May 16/2014)

He played in 40 games in his rookie season in 2014/15 getting a 13-15-2-2 record and this year he has played in two games putting up a 4.68 GAA and a 0.885 S%.

In addition the Giants acquired overage Trevor Cox (forward) from the Medicine Hat Tigers in exchange for 1996-born defenseman Clayton Kirichenko and a second round pick in the 2018 WHL Bantam Draft.

Cox (20) is also from Surrey and finished second in WHL scoring in 2014/15 (29 goals and 109 points) and led the league with 80 assists.

He was named to the Eastern Conference First All-Star Team in 2014/15 and this season he has up eight points in six games this season, but is currently out of the line-up with an upper body injury.

Kirichenko (19) was acquired by the G-Men in a trade with the Saskatoon Blades on May 1, 2014.

He calls Sherwood Park home and played 60 games in a Giants uniform over parts of two seasons for six goals and 16 assists.

Clearly under the new coach the G-men are moving forward and not necessarily at a snails pace.