Thunderbirds select Payton Mount in first round of WHL Bantam Draft
May 4, 2017, 8:35 PM
The Thunderbirds were in Regina on Thursday to prepare for Friday’s Game 1 of the WHL Championship Series. While they were on the ice practicing, the front office brass were in Calgary to attend to the 2017 Bantam Draft.
Unlike the draft in other sports, the Bantam Draft is geared towards the future as the players selected aren’t eligible to play full time for their WHL teams until the 2018-2019 season. Because of that, teams generally snag the best player available rather than focusing on an immediate need.
The Thunderbirds selected eight players on the day and it started in the first round where the club held the 19th pick overall.
Seattle used that pick to select Payton Mount out of the Delta Hockey Academy in the greater Vancouver area. Mount, a right winger, posted 30 goals and 67 points in 30 games for Delta’s Bantam Prep squad.
He hails from Victoria, B.C. and is listed at 5’8” and 169 pounds.
“Payton Mount is as a pure goal scorer as there is in this draft,” Seattle Director of Player Personnel Cal Filson said in a statement released by the team. “He is a very intelligent player who is very good in all zones on the ice.”
The Thunderbirds took a defenseman with the 41st pick, in the second round. They selected 6’1” blue-liner Tyrel Bauer from the Airdrie Extreme Bantam AAA squad. Bauer picked up 17 points in 36 games in this past season.
The T-Birds didn’t have a third round pick and went defense again in the fourth round when they selected Kamloops’ native Luke Bateman with the 85th overall pick.
In the seventh round, the team selected a winger, Greg Nelson, who picked up 55 points in 33 games for the Camrose Red Wings. In the eighth round they selected Nelson’s teammate, goalie Ty Marcinkowski with the 173rd pick overall.
Seattle went with a U.S. born player in the ninth round when they picked up Cameron Berg from White Bear Lake, Minn. Berg is a forward and put up 24 goals and 54 points in just 27 games last year for the White Bear Lake Bears.
In the 10th round, Seattle had two picks and finished their day by selecting winger Josh Paulhus with the 200th pick and defenseman Ian Kern from Vancouver with the 217th pick.
Fans can get their first look at these Thunderbirds’ prospects at training camp in the fall.
