Red-hot Leason Eyes Spot On Team Canada Roster
Raiders’ winger suddenly on radar for Team Canada’s world-juniors roster
Calgary-raised right-winger Brett Leason wasn’t expecting this.
Despite confidence in his offensive abilities, he wasn’t expecting to open the current campaign with an eye-popping 19-game pointstreak (and counting), the longest such spree in the Western Hockey League in a decade.
After twice sliding through the NHL Draft, he likely wasn’t expecting to have a handful of couldbe big-league employers already expressing an interest in calling his name when he is eligible for a third time this coming June.
Wasn’t expecting to suddenly be on the radar for a spot on Team Canada’s world-junior roster.
“Yeah, I probably wouldn’t have believed it,” Leason said.
Understandable, since this sort of sizzling start would have been difficult to even dream up.
The 19-year-old Leason has been a key contributor as the Prince Albert Raiders have cruised to an 18-1-0 record and climbed to the top perch in the Canadian Hockey League’s weekly poll.
He has yet to be blanked in 19 regular-season outings this fall. In fact, he has multiple points in 14 of them. Leason has already racked up 18 goals, tied for tops in the Dub in that category, and ranks second with 41 points.
He has sniped five game-winners — including a top-shelf shortie in Wednesday’s 2-0 victory over the Medicine Hat Tigers — and leads the loop with a staggering plus-31 rating.
Whoa.
“It feels like everything is clicking right now,” said Leason, who skates on the Raiders’ top trio with fellow Calgary kid Sean Montgomery and Aliaksei Protas, of Belarus. “The line is going, just feels like we can’t be stopped. When we’re down in their zone, it feels like we dominate for the whole shift.
“It’s just snowballing from there.”
The result has been an avalanche of goals and assists.
According to the Prince Albert Daily Herald, Leason’s seasonopening point spree is the longest fall scorcher in the WHL since Evander Kane — then a standout for the Vancouver Giants — counted in his first 22 contests of the 2008-09 campaign.
On behalf of the Brandon Wheat Kings, Mark Stone opened with an 18-game roll in 2011-12.
Kane and Stone, of course, are now filling the net at the NHL level.
Leason had proven he could be an offensive go-to at other levels — he finished third in the Alberta Midget Hockey League scoring race in 2015-16, totalling 50 points in 32 games with the Calgary AAA Flames — but nobody could have been anticipating an explosion like this.
After all, his previous career-best in the WHL was a modest 33-point output. He surpassed that mark in late October.
A good-sized dude at 6-foot-4 and 199 lb., Leason will be aiming to continue his tear in Friday’s home date against his former team, the Tri-City Americans.
“He’s big. He has reach. He’s smart. He’s great with the puck,” praised Raiders head coach Marc Habscheid. “And he found another gear (with his skating ), and I think that’s been a key. Because he’s really fast now. And with the size and the skill set of him, he’s tough to handle.
“He’s a great player, but he’s a better person. He’s just a really good teammate. I think the most impressive thing is he’s had this success suddenly this year and at the end of last year, and his teammates are happier for him than he is. That says a lot about him.”
Suddenly, a lot of folks are talking about the shy sharpshooter from Calgary.
On Thursday, NHL Central Scouting released its latest ‘Players to Watch’ list for the upcoming draft. Leason’s name is on there.
He’s also elbowed his way into the conversation for world junior duties, as evidenced by his invite to suit up for Team WHL in the CIBC Canada-Russia Series. (Leason collected one assist during that two-game audition.)
His trajectory is reminiscent of Tanner Pearson’s rise from undrafted long-shot to bronzemedallist to first-round selection in 2012.
Every teen puck prospect from Tsawwassen to Truro dreams of wearing Canada’s colours at the annual world-junior tournament, but Leason says he had stopped giving it much thought. Why?
Seemed too far-fetched … Until recently.
“My play kind of took me to setting that goal,” Leason said. “Probably when I got the call that I was going to be in the CanadaRussia Series, that’s kind of when it changed and when I said, ‘Yeah, I have a shot if I can keep this going.’ Obviously, I was getting noticed for good reasons.
“But I try to keep it out of my mind … Right now, just keep playing and keep showing off what I can do.”