Koules Picks Medicine Hat

Photo: John Sullivan

Like father like son, Miles Koules has decided that the Western Hockey League is the right fit for him and announced earlier today on Twitter that he'll join the Medicine Hat Tigers next season. The 5'10 right winger from California will follow in the footsteps of his father, former Tampa Bay Lightning owner Oren Koules, who played three years in the WHL with six different clubs including Medicine Hat. 

The news is good for Medicine Hat and the WHL but may sting a bit for the University of North Dakota where Koules indicated he would play had he opted for the collegiate route. According to Brad Elliot Schlossman, Koules is the third such player that UND has lost to the CHL in the past 10 months. 

CHL Not Winning Every Battle

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A lot has been made this summer about the ongoing recruiting war over players between the CHL and NCAA programs. While the number of players backing out of their college commitment in favour of the CHL has actually gone down the last few years, the high profile players doing it in a short span this summer have drawn more attention to the subject.

I think it would be hard to argue that the CHL isn't winning this border skirmish and will continue to do so unless the NCAA alters some rules specifically for NCAA hockey and I am not sure if that is even possible for them to consider. But until then, they'll continue to lose more of the big players than they win.

But that's not to say that college hockey is not without some victories of their own. There are plenty of cases where high caliber players with CHL options are still headed down the college path, or at least haven't eliminated that option.

NCAA Canadian Invasion Underway

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Above is a picture of the CN Tower. If you're taking in Toronto and checking off your list of "Touristy things to See and Do", it's probably near the top of it. A Leafs game at the ACC? of course. The Hockey Hall of Fame? Check. The Art Gallery? Done. Casa Loma? Yep. Queen Street? Sure. Blue Jays baseball or Argonauts football at Rogers Center? Uh huh. The Indy race if you're lucky? You know it.

What's left? Well... how about taking in a NCAA hockey game too?

The NCAA Comes North

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Remember last month how Paul Kelly and College Hockey Inc. were mysteriously absent from the World Hockey Summit in Toronto? We had Mr. Kelly on the The Pipeline Show that week to discuss the matter. Well, the NCAA will get its time in the Ontario limelight after all as College Hockey Inc. has created the “NCAA Collegiate Hockey Summit” for this weekend.

Moore From the Pipeline - Part 3

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The Pipeline Show is excited to bring you a series of guest player blogs by some of the top players eligible for the 2009 NHL Entry Draft. For a complete recap of the blogs so far, click on '2009 Guest Blogs' under 'Labels' down the right-hand side of your screen. To date we have heard from John Moore, defenceman with the Chicago Steel in the USHL, and Ethan Werek of the Kingston Frontenacs. We have a few other players lined up who have yet to contribute.

Here now is the latest entry from defenceman John Moore

Inbound Collegian Jumps Ship

com-mit-ment  [kuˈmit-munt] ...
1. the act of committing.
2. the state of being committed.
3. the act of committing, pledging, or engaging oneself.
4. a pledge or promise; obligation: I have made a commitment to play for Cornell..

I bolded definition #4 and altered the example given by dictionary.com to make it relavent to hockey. The definition also reminds me of the old saying "A promise is a promise". Well maybe a promise is a promise but a commitment apparently means diddly-squat.

News out of the QMJHL yesterday has promising 17-year-old forward Jordon Escott moving from his Jr.A team in Amherst, NS to the QMJHL's P.E.I. Rocket. Happens all the time, I know, but not usually a month after the player made a commitment to a NCAA program.

As TPS's comrade Nathan Fournier talked about on his blog, Escott had pledged his allegiance to Cornell not long before representing Canada East at the 2008 World Junior A Challenge in Camrose earlier in November.

Not to sound hypocritical because both Dean and I are on the record as saying we believe kids should be able to put off their NCAA commitments until they are 18, but, those aren't the rules in place. We've talked to players who admitted they committed to the NCAA when they were very young and may have made a different decision as they became 17 or 18 but those guys all followed through on their promise anyway because that's the right thing to do.

I feel bad for the NCAA programs who have to constantly cope with recruits who leave after a year or two - like Michigan, North Dakota or Boston College. I wrote back in the summer that I think the rules should be changed.

During he 2008 WJAC in Camrose I kept hearing whispers about Canada West defenceman Dylan Olsen. Olsen has yet to commit to a NCAA program although he told us in October that he'd narrowed his choices down to 5 teams (North Dakota being the only one he named). He was scheduled to fly down to Grand Forks in November to check things out.

The rumors in Camrose were that Olsen might jump to the Medicine Hat Tigers, the WHL franchise that owns his major junior rights. That hasn't happened but I still haven't confirmed if Olsen has committed to a school or if his trip to Grand Forks went as planned - although I have been told that Olsen may have been in North Dakota last weekend taking in the action at Ralph Engelstad Arena. That comes from a media source down there but just in case, I'll keep the name off the record.

Today's news of Escott ditching Cornell for PEI reminded me of Olsen although the two scenarios have one major difference; if Olsen joined Medicine Hat tomorrow, at least he wouldn't be doing so while slapping a NCAA school in the face in the process.

It would be interesting to know the details of why Escott is suddenly enamored with P.E.I. when a month ago he had pledged... promised... committed to attending Cornell. What could P.E.I. have done to sway him? Does it all really boil down to cash or is there more to it?

This one might be interesting to keep an eye on and dig a little more into.

In the meantime, the Rocket are pleased to add a talented youngster like Escott to their organization. Here's the story the day after according to The Guardian and beat writer Charles Reid.

What's your take?