WHL NOTEBOOK: Burzynski settles into new home

BY PERRY BERGSON
BRANDON SUN

 

If you watch Grayson Burzynski on the ice, he’s clearly a good player.

The 20-year-old Brandon Wheat Kings defenceman, who is on pace for a career year offensively, is smooth and thinks the game at a high level. Off the ice, the engaging, highly social Winnipegger might be an all-star.

“I just think it’s who I am,” Burzynski said. “I’m not going to be someone I’m not. I’m not going to be an ass, it’s not who I am. I like to get along with everyone.”

The fifth-year WHL player, who is in his rookie campaign, has certainly made a good impression on Wheat Kings head coach and general manager Marty Murray.

“We’ve enjoyed having him both on and off the ice,” Murray said. “He’s got a big personality, and I think our players are drawn to him. He’s pretty easy-going and really good in the locker room.”

When Brandon acquired the big defenceman in the spring, they also picked up high-scoring forward Luke Mistelbacher. The two have played together for four years now.

“He’s awesome,” Mistelbacher said. “He’s funny, I think everyone likes him. He’s just that kind of guy.”

Burzynski’s path to Brandon has certainly had some detours.

He was born in Iowa City, Iowa, when his physician father was in his residency, but he began skating at age three while he was living in Newfoundland.

Life quickly got in the way, however, because he was born with a cyst in the femoral head of his hip, which created a pocket of water in the middle, and he broke the bone.

“That stopped skating obviously,” Burzynski said. “I was in a full body cast from my nipples down my whole right leg and up to my knee on my left leg for six months. I started skating a little bit after then but then broke it again when I was five.

“That was another six months, and then I had surgery on it. That was a year of my life, so I didn’t really start playing hockey until I was six.”

In that time, the family had moved to Victoria and later Winnipeg, where Burzynski grew up.

His love of the game escalated quickly when his father, Jeff, won an outdoor rink package in an auction at the Ice Crystal Gala, which is held by the Children’s Hospital Foundation of Manitoba.

“I had an outdoor rink my whole childhood in our backyard, which was awesome,” said Burzynski, whose family also includes mother Jen and sisters Sidney and Piper. “It wasn’t very big, but for an eight year old, it was pretty big. I could skate around. When I started going out with my friends, I would just skate at my house.”

When he began playing hockey he was always a centre, saying he would push the puck forward at draws and just try for a breakaway every time. When he got older, one of his coaches, Jay Genik or Larry Woo, moved him back to defence because he had a good head for the game and could move the puck.

While volleyball was the sport for his immediate family — and Burzynski played that too — there is hockey in his extended family.

Brandon actually drafted Burzynski’s cousin Quinn Parker in the fifth round in 2022, but the rangy forward never skated in the WHL and is now out of the game: His sister Keara Parker plays at the University of St. Thomas in Minnesota.

Also, one of his grandfathers, Tom Bell, was in the Montreal Canadiens organization.

When Burzynski got to the AAA level, he played U15 with the Winnipeg Monarchs, with a one-game call-up to the U17s in his WHL draft year, 2020.

“I didn’t even know what getting drafted meant until I got drafted,” Burzynski said. “I had no idea, which I wouldn’t change. I was such a goofball. I just enjoyed my bantam years.”

In a pick they had acquired from the Portland Winterhawks, the Swift Current Broncos took him 44th overall, two picks after his best friend, Rylan Gould of Headingley.

SWIFT START

Honestly, his timing couldn’t have been much worse. He made the jump to U18 in 2020-21, which was the lost COVID season. He suited up for just two games.

It also cost him the opportunity to attend a training camp in Swift Current at age 15. Instead, he headed to Saskatchewan a year later, wide-eyed and not expecting much. Then he unexpectedly earned a spot.

“I only packed for two weeks, I didn’t think I was going to make the team,” Burzynski said. “It’s not close (to home) … I only had five pairs of underwear or something like that. I had nothing. But once I saw it, I definitely wanted to make it. It was pretty cool, and everyone in that organization was nice and welcoming.

“I was a home body when I was 16 and really wanted to be home, but when the second half rolled around, I had so much fun as a 16 year old.”

One of the attractions was the tightness of the team in the community of 18,000. Since nobody was more than a 10-minute drive away, they did everything together.

“It was awesome,” Burzynski said. “My best friend Rylan Gould, we were drafted together, we were in it together as 16 year olds. We were a four-minute drive, so I basically lived with him … Literally, every day you were doing something with the guys.”

On the ice, it wasn’t as welcoming. It was a real challenge as the lanky youngster tried to make the transition to major junior.

“It’s brutal,” Burzynski said. “It was awful. COVID messed it up. I wasn’t ready to play. Most teams I wouldn’t have made, but with Swift, I was lucky we were in a rebuild. It sucks. Being 16 and away from home is also really hard, but it’s even harder playing.”

It’s not an easy league for any rookie blue-liner, but Burzynski found it especially tough.

 

He remembers meeting the Edmonton Oil Kings one night and defending against players like Dylan Guenther, Jake Neighbours, and Justin Sourdif, who all play in the National Hockey League now.

“Those guys as a 16 year old, it’s so hard,” Burzynski said. “You just know they’re going to play in the NHL, and I can barely skate.”

While the fundamentals of his game were what allowed him to get drafted and crack the roster, he quickly realized everything he did would have to improve. Fortunately, he was blessed with the criminally underrated virtue of self-awareness.

“In my first year, I had to find something that would keep me in the lineup,” Burzynski said. “I’m not a physical guy, it’s maybe one or two hits a game. I knew that wasn’t going to be it, so I used my brain.

“Breaking pucks out was what I focused on. At 16 and 17, it was ‘OK, I’m going to be the best at breaking the puck out.’ Even now, I still carry that. I try to be the best puck-moving defenceman, but that set me apart and kept me in the lineup.”

Along with evolution, he simply had to get quicker. He was six-foot-one and 203 pounds when he was drafted — he’s six-foot-four and 211 pounds now — so his skating became a major focus.

“I was not a WHL skater when I came into the league, and even now, I am not even close,” Burzynski said. “Even now, I’m not the greatest skater, but I’ve worked on it and worked on it a ton.”

You can see the progression in his game reflected in his numbers, with a dramatic upturn in his 19-year-old season.

After posting six, 12 and 13 points in his first three seasons, he exploded for 11 goals and 36 assists last season.

NEW HOME

Last spring, after Swift Current was eliminated in the quarterfinals, Burzynski expected to be dealt but was initially told he would come to camp and lead the way before being traded during the season.

Instead, Brandon and Swift Current engineered a blockbuster deal on May 7 after the Wheat Kings learned overage defenceman Quinn Mantei wouldn’t be returning.

“From a playing standpoint, when we lost Mantei, we needed someone to fill in,” Murray said. “They’re obviously different types of players, but he’s done a real good job of quarterbacking our first unit of the power play and creating offence.”

Burzynski and Mistelbacher were acquired from Swift Current for the Wheat Kings’ own pick in the first round, 15th overall, plus 15-year-old prospect Alex Letourneau, a second-round pick in 2025 originally belonging to the Saskatoon Blades, third-round picks in 2027 and 2028, and a sixth-round pick in 2028.

“I was at work actually, driving my truck, and I got a call from Rylan (Gould) — I don’t know how he found out, I think our agent told him — and he said, ‘Dude, you were just traded to Brandon,’” Burzynski said. “I said, ‘What?’ I’m driving and working so I didn’t really even process it.

“I knew something was going to happen, and Chad had asked me for a list of teams I would want to go to, and I hadn’t even given him the list, but Brandon would have been on it. I’m happy. Being close to home is incredible.”

The second part of the equation was coming with his buddy Mistelbacher. He said that made the transition even easier.

“We drove out together on the first day here and hung out together for the first two weeks,” Burzynski said. “Now we’re all buddies, but for the first two weeks we hung out and got comfortable together.”

While they all play in the same league, every WHL organization has its own personality and its own way of doing things. Their schedules and internal cultures are all different, and that was something Burzynski noticed pretty quickly.

He said while four years isn’t a long time in the internal scheme of things, it’s a sizeable chunk of time in junior hockey, and he had grown accustomed to Swift Current’s way of doing things.

“Anything that is done here feels different than in Swift,” Burzynski said. “Everything was an adjustment. Game-day routines, even our day-to-day schedule, like practising at 1. In Swift Current I was basically napping at 1 because the day was done at noon. We’d go into the rink at 8 and leave by noon. I’m used to the schedule now, but every little thing is different.”

The one thing that didn’t change is Burzynski’s productivity.

In 24 games this season, he has six goals and 22 assists, which projects to a career-high 78-point season. His longtime teammate Mistelbacher isn’t surprised.

“He’s a big body, a big presence, and he’s got some offensive talent,” Mistelbacher said. “That’s always fun to have in the O-zone.”

Now that he’s settled in, Burzynski said Brandon has proven to be a perfect spot.

Another big change this season is he’s been added to a WHL leadership group for the first time after Brandon named him an alternate captain. The big defenceman said it won’t change anything he does, and was likely a little overdue.

“It’s just who I am, to be honest,” Burzynski said. “I lead through who I am. I think I’m a leader at heart. I’m really surprised I didn’t have a leadership role per se in Swift Current last season. I couldn’t believe it, to be honest. I wasn’t expecting one here, but just through who I am, I think that comes with it.”

It’s a leadership group that has been tested. Brandon had a terrible start to the season, going 0-4-1-0, which was a shock to a club with high expectations.

“Before the season started, we were going for it,” Burzynski said. “We knew it could be an unbelievable team. All the guys in the room thought it, and it kind of humbled us a little bit, which is good. We lost our first five or whatever games, but now we’re starting to get our confidence and a little bit of swagger back. I think that’s what we’ve been missing. “He still believes his club has a high upside, with maintaining some consistency a key element of any future success. He added they also have to do better in their own end.

“When we’re on, we’re on,” Burzynski said. “We can score five or six goals in a period easily. Obviously our offence is there, we just have to commit to playing on the other side of the puck.”

NEXT CHAPTER

While next season is a long ways away, it is on Burzynski’s mind.

In this new age when major junior players can head to college, education has taken on a new importance for many players. Burzynski is taking a biology class through Athabasca University as he prepares for the college ranks after this season.

His close friend Gould went to Michigan Tech — this is the first year in the last decade they haven’t played together — but he returned to the WHL after six games and was subsequently dealt to the Everett Silvertips on Oct. 28.

Still, college hockey is on the big defenceman’s mind.

“It’s a great opportunity,” Burzynski said. “The league down there is incredible. It’s perfect for me. I was thinking about going last year and had some offers, but I think I made the right decision staying. Now, just watching guys go through it — Rylan came back to the Dub and didn’t enjoy his time — but seeing guys go through it first, I can make a really good decision on where I’m going.”

While he’s no longer skating with Gould, he’s seeing more of some other familiar faces.

His parents and his girlfriend, Maeve, have been out to an overwhelming majority of the home games, and Burzynski loves to look up and see them in the crowd.

“It’s awesome,” Burzynski said. “When I was 16, 17, 18 and 19, the last four years, Brandon was where I would see everyone. It was like coming home. Every game is like home now. It’s not just home for the team, it feels like my home too.

“It’s been really nice.”