The first-ever player selected by the North Bay Battalion in the spring of 2013 is on the move.
Overage forward Brett McKenzie has been traded to the Owen Sound Attack where he joins former Battalion defenceman Brady Lyle.
The Battalion has acquired Matthew Struthers from Owen Sound, the Ontario Hockey League club announced Wednesday.
The Battalion also got a 14th-round pick in the 2018 OHL Priority Selection and a second-rounder in 2020 in exchange for overager McKenzie.
Struthers, six-foot-two and 194 pounds, is a left shot who has scored nine goals and earned nine assists for 18 points in 32 games this season.
The 18-year-old Milton, Ont., resident has 24 goals and 26 assists for 50 points while accumulating 34 penalty minutes in 145 games over two-plus seasons since Owen Sound made him a third-round pick in the 2015 OHL Priority Selection from the Halton Hurricanes minor midgets. In 21 playoff games, he has two goals and three assists for five points with six penalty minutes.
Stan Butler, Battalion head coach and Director of Hockey Operations, would not elaborate on the demand out there for McKenzie but did say he has been taking a lot of calls from other teams recently.
Butler believes the Troops filled a need by getting younger and better with this move.
“We really had a need on our team for a 1999 centreman, we don’t have any on our team. We feel that he is a guy, and giving Matt the opportunity he will have here that his numbers will grow,” stated Butler noting both players have nine goals so far this season.
However, Butler admits moving his longtime Battalion player was difficult.
“It was a hard conversation, I mean Brett is 20 years old and do the math he has been here five years so that means 25% of his life has been spent with me every day,” stated a candid Butler.
“It was emotional. I really like Brett, he’s a great kid. He has done a lot for our organization but I thought it was a good move for him too. Sometimes change is good and I think in Brett’s case he has got half a year here to show the Vancouver Canucks that he deserves a contract and as an organization, we would love to see him get that contract and move forward in pro,” added Butler noting that Struthers will be in North Bay in time for Thursday's home game versus Oshawa.
In 31 games this season McKenzie has 9 goals along with 14 assists for 23 points.
The Vars, Ontario product has been a bit of a disappointment this season, after returning from the AHL’s Utica Comets in September.
Last year the big forward led the Troops in scoring with 29 goals and 38 assists for 67 points, all career-highs, in 67 games, and was named Battalion’s most outstanding player
McKenzie also played both Team OHL games in 2016 CIBC Canada-Russia series and was in the conversation for Team Canada’s World Junior team in 2017.
In 2015-16, he had 26 goals and 27 assists for 53 points in 66 games and was selected in the 7th-round, 194th overall by the Vancouver Canucks at the NHL Entry Draft in Buffalo, New York in the summer of 2016.
The trade is the third between the Battalion and Attack this season. The Troops acquired goaltender Christian Propp and a 10th-round pick in 2020 for defenceman Brady Lyle and a 2020 seventh-rounder on Oct. 22, a day before swapping a conditional 15th-rounder in 2018 for rearguard Nick King.
