2024 NHL Draft player profile: Tanner Howe, Regina Pats
By the Western Hockey League / Cami Kepke
With two weeks to go until the biggest night of his young career, Tanner Howe is about as far from the bright lights of Las Vegas as you can get.
The 18-year-old is taking the opportunity to step out of the whirlwind of the NHL Draft process and get back to nature on a fishing trip north of his hometown of Prince Albert, Sask.- a family tradition that goes back more than a decade.
“My family usually goes on a fishing trip once every summer,” Howe said. “It’s nice to get away from our phones and just spend some time with your family. It’s a nice getaway. Whoever doesn’t catch the most fish usually buys ice cream that night or something like that.”
As the Howes troll for walleye and pike, you can’t help but wonder just how different their lives will look a year from now.
Tanner is a highly-touted prospect heading into the 2024 NHL Entry Draft and his younger brother, Connor, recently signed a WHL Scholarship and Development Agreement with the Prince Albert Raiders.
NHL Central Scouting has the elder Howe slotted 41st among all North American skaters ahead of the draft- a far cry from how he broke into the Western Hockey League as an undersized fourth-round pick of the Regina Pats.
“I definitely had a chip on my shoulder trying to make that team,” Howe recalled. “I think I was pretty little when I got drafted. That summer I took pretty seriously and gained a lot of weight, got bigger, got stronger.”
Pats Head Coach Brad Herauf, an assistant at the time, recalls Howe making a statement in his first shift in the WHL bubble with a flying body check- prompting then-Head Coach John Paddock to turn to Herauf and declare ‘That kid is going to be a player.’
“(Tanner) wasn’t expected to be there, so that’s how smart he is,” Herauf said. “He’s looking at the lineup, he’s understanding the gameplay. He’s understanding how you help teams win at such a young age, and that was the way he was helping us win. He was 15 years old playing with that spunk. That inspired the rest of our team when you see a 15-year-old fourth-round pick flying around and having six or seven body checks a game and making plays. That’s what he’s done since day one.”
The 5-foot-11, 182-pound forward found great success playing on a line with superstar Connor Bedard for two seasons and learned a lot about preparation and professional habits from the NHL Rookie of the Year nominee.
But this season Howe had to prove what kind of player he was without Bedard.
“There was a lot of talk around that going into the year where he wasn’t going to be there,” Howe added. “I worked on my game to try to round out my game, to play PK, power play, five-on-five and try to produce in all areas. I think I had a pretty good year and I think I proved a lot of them wrong.”
His coach will sign off on that sentiment.
Howe earned the team captaincy as a 17-year-old and led the Pats with 28 goals (including two game-winners and a shorthanded tally) and 49 assists for 77 points in 68 games.
Despite Regina being in a building year in the junior hockey cycle, he also worked to keep his teammates engaged and didn’t give his opponents an inch on the ice while getting under their skin.
Howe models his game after CHL alumni like Brad Marchand and Matthew Tkachuk, cunning goal scorers who will rile up the opposition while sporting a devious grin.
Frankly, he just thinks the edge they play with is what makes hockey fun.
“The way that Tanner plays and his presence in the dressing room and the way he carries himself, I think that people are always going to respect him,” Herauf added. “He demands that effort out of his teammates. You can’t have your ‘A’ game all the time, but I think Tanner, for me, has one of the best ‘B’ games. If he’s not contributing offensively, he does so many little things that are not on the stat sheet. He can play anywhere in the lineup- left, right or centre. He does so many of those little things to help you win in clutch times. Those things go unnoticed a lot.”
NHL teams have certainly taken notice, and that’s what will matter most come the weekend of June 28.
Howe earned invitations to the Kubota CHL/NHL Top Prospects Game and met with 21 teams at the 2024 NHL Combine earlier this month.
He’ll be at the Sphere in Las Vegas to hear his name called and be vaulted into a new level of the game.
But for now, he has some fish to catch.
