After opening the season in the WHL with the Calgary Hitmen, promising young forward Ty Hynes has joined the AJHL’s Lloydminster Bobcats for junior A seasoning.
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Hynes, 17, played in both of Lloydminster’s home victories last weekend, 6-2 over the Drumheller Dragons on Saturday and a 3-0 shutout against the Drayton Valley Thunder on Friday.
The Halloween night game Friday in Lloyd was Hynes’ first action since the rookie from Medicine Hat, Alta., last dressed for the Hitmen on Oct. 5.
“Yeah, just getting my feet wet,” Hynes said after his second game with the Bobcats.
“I was still ready to go, and I was pretty excited to play. I thought it went really well for success team-wise. I thought it was a really good stepping-stone, moving on to next weekend.
“The boys here are really good. We’ve been buzzing as of late. It’s been good to get on a streak and keep building towards Christmastime and just building up wins.”
Ty Hynes joined Lloyd from the WHL’s Calgary Hitmen. John MacNeil – Meridian Source
In moving from Calgary (10-3-1) to Lloydminster (10-6), Hynes has gone from one upper-echelon team to another, albeit in different leagues and at different levels.
His first WHL point came just seven minutes into his first major junior game, Sept. 19 in Lethbridge. He and Ethan Moore assisted on linemate Kale Dach’s power-play goal to get the Hitmen started in their 5-3 season-opening victory over the Lethbridge Hurricanes.
Hynes dressed for four regular-season games in as many weeks with Calgary, so he was anxious to step up out of the press box and onto the ice in his mother’s native Lloydminster.
“They said they want me to gain some confidence (now) and help them out in the future, for sure,” Hynes said of the messaging from Hitmen management as he departed Calgary two weeks ago.
“It was definitely hard (sitting out), but I was just happy to be there, in general. I was still pretty excited to be there. It was a good opportunity while I was there, but it’s good to get down (to junior A) and get some confidence and play, for sure.”
While he didn’t hit the scoresheet in his first weekend with the Bobcats, the graduate of the South Alberta Hockey Academy (SAHA) U18 prep team was thankful his new junior club put him in a position to succeed, slotting him on lines with
Kade Fendelet, Jack Ferguson and Quinn Smith.
“Yeah, Fendelet and Ferguson yesterday, two really good players,” Hynes said. “They bring a lot to the team, especially Fendelet. He’s a big captain and big leader for us, and Fergy is good as well.
“And then today, I played with (Ferguson again and) Smith, who has some skill and can make plays.
He’s a really good player as well.”
Along with having family members living in Lloydminster, helping ease Hynes’ adaptation to the Border City is his familiarity with Bobcats like freshman forward Ethan Elefante and second-year defencemen Dylan Deets and Noah Smith.
Hynes played U15 prep hockey with Deets at Edge School in Calgary.
“I know Noah Smith as well, from Brooks,” he said. “I skate with him sometimes in the summer and I know his brother Cage (a rookie forward in the WHL with the Edmonton Oil Kings).”
Hynes wowed the Bobcats with his skill during their spring camp, after scoring a point per game last winter with SAHA’s U18 prep team in the Canadian Sport School Hockey League.
“My brother played with him quite a bit (growing up),” Noah Smith said. “I think I played on one spring hockey team with Ty, but other than that, it was mostly my brother, a younger age group.
“Ty is a great kid. Getting that experience to play up in major junior, and bringing that experience down here, he can get comfortable in our league and start to produce. He’s definitely got the capabilities of doing it. A skilled guy.”
Even after the trade of veteran Alessio Nardelli to the SJHL’s Battlefords North Stars last week, the Bobcats were still carrying 14 forwards, so it remains a competitive environment for Hynes and company as they try to stay in the lineup on a game-to-game basis.
Lloydminster general manager Nigel Dube said the club waited until last weekend for Hynes’ debut to give him more practice time, rather than rush him into the lineup Oct. 28, when the Bobcats lost 3-1 to the host Whitecourt Wolverines.
Hynes didn’t attend the Bobcats’ main training camp this fall, but he’s a player the organization had envisioned playing at both the major junior and junior A levels this season.
“It’s a matter of the timing of it and working with these Western Hockey League teams and the new Western Canadian Development Model,” Dube said. “He’s here now and (it’s important) for him to get the reps in. There’s going to be hiccups along the way, no doubt about it, but I thought he had a solid Friday night for us, and again just building every game.”
Dube has watched the six-foot, 180-pound Hynes for three-plus seasons, including his prep journey from Edge to SAHA.
“He’s got a skill set,” said the Bobcats’ GM. “With any of these players that are coming from the U18 level, at 17 years old, you’re going up against 20-year-olds, you’re going up against men. Every inch is a lot tougher to get to, so when you try to make the easy play, or the hockey term a soft play, it usually doesn’t work out for you.
“For him, it’s (a matter of playing) his 200-foot game on the ice and making sure that he’s ready to go every rep. He’s going to have to compete for those inches to get there and be sound on both sides of the puck.”
Hynes almost had his first AJHL goal with four minutes left in Saturday’s game, but Drumheller goaltender Brandon Williams stopped the newcomer’s close-range shot.
“Gotta get that one up,” Hynes said with a smile. “It was a great pass by (Brady) Gamble. And it was a good save, for sure.”
Hynes already feels welcomed by his new teammates in Lloydminster.
“Just coming in and being the new guy, a lot of guys took me under their wing and really helped me get comfortable being in a new place and making those emotions pretty easy to transfer into the game and be able to play as the player that I am,” said Hynes, a fan of the Montreal Canadiens.
Hynes’ mother and grandfather were in attendance for the weekend action, and his billet family attended Friday’s game. His billets previously hosted forward Nolan Bisson, who spent the early part of this season with the Bobcats before returning to the U18 AAA St. Albert Raiders. Bisson, a Spokane Chiefs’ WHL prospect, has three goals and four points in three games since rejoining St. Albert.
Hynes was back at the rink Sunday, watching the U18 AAA Lloydminster Lancers defeat the Lethbridge Hurricanes 5-2 at the Hub. From his southern Alberta roots, he knows multiple players with that Lethbridge team.
One of Hynes’ former SAHA teammates, Brayden Ryan-MacKay, wasn’t in the Drumheller lineup for Saturday’s AJHL game in Lloydminster. The 17-year-old forward has played four games with the Dragons after opening this season with the Medicine Hat Tigers, last year’s WHL champions.
Another SAHA graduate, goaltender Kannen Kirkwood, began this AJHL season with the Bobcats, but didn’t play any regular-season games. More recently, the 18-year-old Kirkwood had a 1-1 record after two games with the Winnipeg Blues
of the Manitoba junior A league.
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