Vlooswyk adjusting nicely to WHL speed and physicality
Count Luke Vlooswyk as yet another proponent of hockey academies.
No knock on his earlier mentors, but the coaches at the Edge School, located just west of Calgary, are paid instructors and hockey combined with academics is the way of life at the institution.
“100 per cent, it’s been a really good year for my development. I’ve got to develop a more offensive side of my game,” the Calgary native, who turned 17 in January, said Thursday. “The coaches have been awesome.”
The fact that the Edge U18 prep team, coached by James Poole, finished the Canadian Sport School Hockey League regular season standings in second place has also helped with Vlooswyk’s rise.
“It’s been awesome. We’ve got a really good team this year,” he said. “When you’re playing with a lot of like-minded players who have the same goals as you, it makes it really easy to play with them.”
The Rebels’ first pick, 17th overall, in the 2022 WHL Prospects Draft, Vlooswyk was in the running for regular employment with the Rebels last fall but was reassigned with the club already top heavy on the back end.
With rearguards Hunter Mayo and Quentin Bourne out with injuries, Vlooswyk, a product of the Bow Valley Minor Hockey Association who last season played with the U18AAA Calgary Buffaloes as a 15-year-old, was called up to the Rebels March 1 and scored his first WHL goal that night in a 7-5 loss to the visiting Swift Current Broncos.
The rookie blueliner moved in from the point, hauled in a feed from Kai Uchacz and, while partially airborne, beat netminder Reid Dyck from the high slot.
GRAB THAT PUCK!
Luke Vlooswyk has his career goal in the Western League!@Rebelshockey pic.twitter.com/huSi9pXVUx
— The WHL (@TheWHL) March 2, 2024
“It was pretty exciting. I just saw an open seam, Uch made a nice pass and it was in the back of the net,” he said. “I got the puck on my stick and as I was releasing it I got hit. It ended up being a pretty cool picture. I felt like I was Bobby Orr flying through the air.”
Video of the goal was shared on Hockey Night in Canada, courtesy of host and Red Deer native Ron MacLean.
“That has to be thanks to my mom (Lisa). She knows Ron MacLean really well,” said Vlooswyk. “That was definitely super cool. I had a bunch of buddies texting me with that.”
Obviously, jumping from the U18 AAA ranks to the WHL is no small step, but Vlooswyk, who played one game with the Rebels last season and two so far in March, is feeling more comfortable every day.
“Every practice, every game, I feel like I’m adjusting to the speed, the pace of the game,” he said. “The more I adjust to it the more I feel comfortable here that I can play with the big boys.”
At six-foot-four and 191 pounds, Vlooswyk can certainly handle the physical side of the major junior game, and down the road should be a force on his own.
“I think I’m going to be a big, mean, strong defenceman and I think over the years I can develop as more of a two-way player,” he said.
“For now, what they (coaches) are preaching to me is just play that really big defensive role and use my biggest asset, which is my size.”
Notable: The Rebels can clinch a playoff spot this weekend by claiming three points in a weekend series with the Calgary Hitmen. The teams meet Friday in Calgary and Saturday at the Peavey Mart Centrium . . . The Rebels have four players on the league’s weekly injury list — defencemen Mayo (upper body, day-to-day) and Bourne (lower body, week-to-week) and forwards Matthew Gard (upper body, day-to-day) and Carson Latimer (upper body, week-to-week).
