Blades trade Molendyk to Medicine Hat for pair of players, five draft picks

The Saskatoon Blades are saying goodbye to one of its franchise’s best players of all time.

Late on Monday night, the Saskatoon Blades announced that it’s trading star 19-year-old defenceman Tanner Molendyk and forward Misha Volotovskii to the Medicine Hat Tigers for 2007-born forward Hayden Harsanyi and 17-year-old defenceman Jack Kachkowski and five picks in the WHL Prospects Draft.

The five draft picks the Blades are acquiring are a 2025 first-round pick, 2025 second-round pick (via Portland), 2026 third-round pick, 2026 fourth-round pick and a 2028 fifth-round pick.

“Throughout this deadline and through this year, we’ve had a couple different mandates and things have changed a little bit given our standing this year and how well our team has played, maybe unexpectedly to some people,” said Blades general manager Colin Priestner. “We had our eye on making sure that we were taking care of the future of this hockey club not just for the next year but the future four, five six years.

“When you have a guy like Molendyk and it’s not a year where you have the assets to take a run and win a championship the new way — which would be adding a bunch of high-end players … It was pretty clear Tanner was the kind of guy who could be a one-man rebuild so to speak in terms of what you can get back for a player of his calibre.”

In the release announcing the trade, Priestner made a comment no player would wear 24 again for the Blades.

“Tanner is such a special person. You don’t find guys like him. He’s from town of about 200 (people) in northern B.C. He’s just a unique guy,” Priestner said. “He’s very low-key, laid back, humble and just a great person,” Priestner said. “I don’t know if we will have another defenceman quite like him. I don’t know when you look back in the history books at Blades’ all-time defenceman, I would put him in the top three … He goes down as one of the best Blades ever. I don’t think it would be fair to anybody else to even give them that number 24. That’s his number and he’s earned for that number to never be worn again.”

Priestner said this deal has been in the works for a while, with WHL teams knowing since October the top-end defenceman would be available.

“The process sped up over the last two weeks I would say. A lot of interest from our conference in him. There’s teams in the central division that are all loading up and adding top-end players and some really good teams in that division,” Priestner said.

The Molendyk trade marks the second major deal Priestner has made in the last week.

On Jan. 2, the Blades sent long-time veteran Brandon Lisowsky and a 2028 fifth-round pick to the Victoria Royals for 20-year-old forward Tanner Scott and second-round draft picks in both 2025 and 2026.

The blockbuster trades come as the Blades still sit in second place in the Western Hockey League’s eastern conference.

“To me, nothing really changes. We have played the last month without Tanner — he has been away at the World Juniors for quite a while now. We’ve gotten accustomed to what life looks like on our backend and in our room without him. The message today is we are adding two exciting young players that are not 16, they are 17 and they can help us win every night,” Priestner said.

While the trade might be hard to fathom for some considering the Blades’ record and their run to the east final last year, the Blades’ cupboard of draft picks was bare after the team went all-in last year to get big name players like Fraser Minten and Alexander Suzdalev.

Back in November in an interview with 650 CKOM, Priestner admitted it was going to be important to get those draft picks back.

“When you acquire a player like Minten and you give up a couple first-round draft picks – which we hadn’t really done in the past – you’re going to have to recoup those at some point,” Priestner said in November.

“We’ll continue to go along here and see where we stand and not just where we stand in standings, but we also have to make sure the health of our organization long-term is strong,” he added. “We don’t really want to have years where we have no first, no seconds, no thirds. That’s are really tough in the Western League to overcome when eventually that draft class is going to make up probably 20 per cent of your league. We have to be really cognizant of that.”

It’s unclear at this time if the Blades are finished trading right now—the WHL’s trade deadline later this week. Priestner is scheduled to speak to the media later in the afternoon on Tuesday.

As for what players the Blades are getting in return, Priestner said he wouldn’t have made this trade without getting the talent of Kachkowski and Harsanyi.

Kachkowski is from St. Albert, Alta and suited up with the Tigers for 37 games where he’s registered eight points.

Harsanyi is from Calgary, Alta and has four points in seven games played this season.

The two are likely to make their debut for the Blades at some point on their current Alberta road trip.

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