Monday notes

Couple things this morning...

It sounds like the Brandon Wheat Kings will have another candidate for their overage spots next year. The Grand Forks (N.D.) Herald is reporting that forward David Toews (younger brother of Jonathan Toews) will leave the University of North Dakota and play major junior next year. The Wheat Kings own his rights and he is from Winnipeg, so presumably he's headed for Brandon.

Toews is a 1990 born player so he'd be an overager next year. The Wheat Kings have probably six players on their current roster who would be in contention for overage jobs next year - forwards Jordan Hale and Shayne Wiebe, defencemen Mark Schneider and Darren Bestland, and goaltenders Jacob DeSerres and Andrew Hayes - so Toews makes seven guys competing for three spots. (I'm assuming that Brent Raedeke, Colby Robak, Alexander Urbom, and Travis Hamonic - who have all signed pro contracts - will not be back next year)

The 2011 Memorial Cup, which will be held in the OHL, is expected to see its hosting honours be awarded today to the Mississauga St. Michael's Majors. This is kind of a surprise considering that the Majors are near the bottom of the OHL in attendance. I suppose being owned by Eugene Melnyk - the guy who owns the Ottawa Senators - doesn't hurt them though. I wonder how many zeros are in the "profits" figure the Majors promised to share with the rest of the league?

I think most of us were expecting the Windsor Spitfires to win the bid. The Spits won last year's Memorial Cup, are probably the favourites going into this year's Memorial Cup, and will still have a heckuva team next year too. But I guess they'll have to win the OHL for a 3rd straight year if they want to be in the Memorial Cup next year as well.

Still with the Memorial Cup, the QMJHL plays game six of their final series tonight. The Moncton Wildcats lead the Saint John Sea Dogs 3 games to 2 and can book their ticket to Brandon with a win tonight in Moncton. A Saint John win means they'll play game seven tomorrow night in Saint John.

Lastly, the BCHL's Vernon Vipers won their 2nd consecutive Royal Bank Cup yesterday, emblematic of Canadian Jr A hockey champions. There were three former WHLers on the Vipers - former Blazer/American Kevin Kraus, former Silvertip/Winterhawk Jonathan Milhouse, and David Robinson, who voluntarily walked away from the WHL in January after playing two and a half years for Chilliwack. They also have several players who were WHL prospects but chose the NCAA route - Sahir Gill (Kamloops), Dan Nycholat (Spokane), Curtis Gedig (Calgary), etc.