Edmonton prospect in spotlight at 15
Tyler Benson continues family tradition that started with his brother Cole, an Oil King
The moment caught the Benson family off-guard.
During the second intermission of the San Jose Sharks and Edmonton Oilers game on Wednesday night, the TSN panel took a break from the pro game to talk about upand-coming players.
All of a sudden, game tape of Kevin and Leonora Benson’s 15-year-old son, Tyler, was in front of a national audience.
“That’s not something we were expecting,” Kevin said. “You’re sitting there with your friends watching a normal game at the rink and he pops up. We didn’t even know he was going to be on. It’s pretty cool.”
The panel pointed to Benson’s record-setting season in the Alberta Major Bantam Hockey League, where he had 146 points, with 57 goals in 33 games with Edmonton’s Southside Athletic Club Southgate Lions as the reason he’s a lock to be picked first overall in the Western Hockey League Bantam Draft on May 2. Before Benson was on TV on Wednesday night, the Vancouver Giants won the league’s draft lottery.
Benson’s former SSAC teammate Giorgio Estephan, who now plays midget AAA, called him and told him to turn the game on.
“It was pretty exciting watching it, just seeing yourself on a show you’ve always watched,” Benson said. “I’ve always watched SportsCentre and it was pretty cool seeing that.”
It’s just about the only thing that Tyler’s older brother Cole, a 17-year-old, second-year centre with the Edmonton Oil Kings, couldn’t prepare him for. As Tyler skated like a man playing against boys this season, he dealt with massive amounts of media attention and had his name bandied around with players like Ty Rattie (who held the AMBHL scoring record before Tyler broke it) and former Giants and current NHLers Brendan Gallagher and Evander Kane.
Cole has been there to share his experiences of going from bantam to midget and eventually junior hockey.
“He tries to stay away from talking too much about the draft and things like that,” Cole said of Tyler. “He’s just going to let it take its own road, really, but he’s really excited about it. He tries not to let the media get to him, he tries to play the game just like he’s played it the last two years in bantam and he’s taking it in stride. He’s really enjoying it.”
“I think for Tyler, just growing up around Cole has helped him a lot,” Kevin said. “Not so much his game now, but just to see things going forth, I think he appreciates a lot of what Cole has done.”
As Cole did in his path to junior, Tyler will play midget hockey next. There had been talk of Tyler getting exceptional-player status through Hockey Canada and the WHL to join the league as a 15-year-old next season, but the Benson family isn’t much interested in seeing that through.
“Our standpoint is the WHL would have to let a family know if they feel a player is ready for the league,” Kevin said. “It’s not for us to go apply for something that he hasn’t even been drafted into yet. That wasn’t our intention at all, to get exceptional status.”
“You never want to have that regret where you, for some reason, you happen to say you left home too early,” Cole said. “We just don’t want him to have to say that, because no one’s ever said they left home too late.”
It seems that the idea isn’t appealing to the Giants, either.
“We’ve never discussed it,” Giants general manager Scott Bonner told the Vancouver Province’s Steve Ewen on the exceptional status issue. “I think players are fine getting here at 16.”
Giants owner Ron Toigo told Ewen, “I think the NHL takes guys too young already.”
It appears that Cole’s experiences factored into the family’s feeling on the subject as well.
“Having Cole already go through it, we know that a 15-year-old probably shouldn’t be doing the travelling that (Cole is) doing at 17,” Kevin said. “So yeah, it’s I think it’s good for him to stay at home one more year, for sure.”
While there’s an appeal to facing the highest competition as soon as possible, Tyler seems at peace with staying home a little longer.
“I think it’s just good to stay home and have another year with your friends that live around you and play midget next year. It’ll help a lot,” he said.
It’ll also let him be a kid for another year, something that can get sucked away from prospects in the countdown until they’re NHL-draft-eligible.
And before the pro talk really starts to heat up, Kevin and Leonora are excited to watch a few Giants-Oil Kings games in the next few years.
“It’d be pretty neat. It’d sure be exciting,” Leonora said, currently wearing Cole’s No. 12 Edmonton jersey. “It’d be fun for them and for us.”
“I think that’d be pretty cool. I’ve never played against him in a league game,” Tyler said. “That’d be pretty fun.”
Benson’s SSAC team is up 2-0 in its best-of-five provincial championship against the Calgary Northstar Sabres. Game 3 is Saturday night at 7:45 at Bill Hunter Arena in west Edmonton. He has 34 points in 10 playoff games.