In the town of Wainwright, Alta., located 50-some kilometres from the Saskatchewan border, Adam Huxley runs summer training sessions that have been frequented by a couple of established NHLers.
They apparently have been anticipating that Cole Reschny would, sooner than later, be joining them on the big stage.
“I’ll never forget, it would have been three or four years ago, Carson Soucy goes, ‘Hey, is it that guy’s draft year this year?’” Huxley reminisced. “I said, ‘Oh no, he’s already drafted.’ Because I thought he was talking about the Western League. When I realized that he was talking about the NHL, I said, ‘Oh, he just turned 15.’ He was like, ‘What?!? That kid is strong!’
“Honestly, they respected him like that at that age. They’d say, ‘That kid is the most mature 15-year-old I’ve ever met.’”
Reschny, at 18, is now an NHL draft pick.
The Calgary Flames made that dream a reality in late June, selecting this promising playmaker in the first round at No. 18 overall.
Immediately considered Calgary’s top pivot prospect, Reschny is now skating as a freshman at the University of North Dakota. During a season-opening set this past weekend against St. Thomas, he was slotted as the Fighting Hawks’ first-line middle-man. After two NCAA appearances, he already has collected his first college goal and his first assist.
“He’s smart. He’s reliable. He plays a whole 200-foot game,” praised Flames general manager Craig Conroy of Reschny, who currently is listed at 5-foot-11 and 185 pounds. “And he just seems to make other people that he plays with better. It’s exciting, especially for a centre, when he just seems to see the ice, makes plays, has that creative offensive side and is also just so sound defensively.
“His overall package and what he’s going to bring, we’re really excited about him. I can’t wait to see how he does at North Dakota this year.”
Calgary Flames prospect Cole Reschny, centre, accepts congratulations after his first NCAA goal.
So far, so good.
While Reschny delivered a two-point performance Sunday, propelling his squad to a 5-2 victory and a series sweep, his most impressive stat came from another column. The lefty won 15-of-17 draws that evening.
“I know how highly they think of him there,” Flames director of player development Ray Edwards said. “I think he was sixth in their fitness testing, which is amazing for an 18-year-old.
“We’re just starting to get to know Cole but he’s an impressive young man, in terms of character and professionalism and maturity and all that stuff, and he plays that way. I watched him take a bunch of faceoffs (during exhibition action) and the way he prepares and goes into the faceoff circle, he looks like a pro. And the way he wins faceoffs, he wins faceoffs like a guy who has played four or five years of pro hockey. He doesn’t just go in there willy-nilly. He has a plan and he executes that plan. Little things like that stand out to me.”
What was ‘the clincher’ for Flames scouts?
It’s no secret that Conroy has been searching for future difference-makers up the middle of the ice, so it was hardly a surprise when the Flames called Reschny’s name at No. 18 overall.
If anything, it was a relief for the organization that he was still available. They had him graded several slots higher.
If you did any reading about Reschny in the lead-up to the 2025 NHL Draft, you’re undoubtedly aware this product of Macklin, Sask., made a major statement with his superb playoff performance on behalf of the Western Hockey League’s Victoria Royals.
Reschny notched nine goals and 16 assists in 11 springtime spins, good for an eye-popping average of 2.27 points per game. Over the past five post-seasons in the WHL, just two players have produced at a better clip in a single run — Connor Bedard in 2023 and Gavin McKenna in 2025.
It was, indeed, Reschny’s playoff show-off that sealed his status as one of the Flames’ top targets, but not only for the reasons that are obvious on the statsheet. They were equally impressed with his defensive work during a second-round showdown with the Spokane Chiefs. His assignment was to keep tabs on Berkly Catton, a finalist for the WHL’s Player of the Year honours and now a rookie with the Seattle Kraken.
“The clincher for me was watching him in that series against Spokane and watching him against Catton’s line, basically head-to-head,” said Tod Button, the Flames director of amateur scouting. “I mean, we were doing all these draft interviews and talking to the defencemen out west and they all told us, ‘Oh, the hardest line to play against is the Catton line,’ or, ‘Oh, the best player is Catton.’
“There were some times where Catton got the better of him, but his resolve and his persistence, it showed. He just kept on coming and coming and coming. To see that, it was impressive.”
Royals skipper James Patrick, who accumulated nearly 1,300 appearances as an NHL defenceman, offers only one counterpoint. Although he’s absolutely in agreement that Reschny was a springtime standout, he noticed the elevation in his game a little earlier than that.
“Down the stretch, the last six weeks and into the playoffs, he was, I would say, as driven and as competitive as any guy we played against,” said Patrick, whose resume includes a five-season stint on the Flames’ blue-line in the mid-90s. “In both series we had, he went head-to-head against their No. 1 guy. We played Tri-City in the first round and their top player was a 20-year-old, a good player in our league, and Cole played against him and certainly came out on top. And then in the Spokane series, we played Cole’s line against Catton and (Andrew) Cristall. Those were probably the two best players in the West. And yet, when we played in Spokane, they played that line against Cole too because the other lines couldn’t handle him.
“So what I saw is how driven he was, how competitive he was, how he went chin-to-chin. He was not going to give an inch. Catton is a very good player. I mean, he went eighth overall (in 2024). He is an elite skater. And they both were the two best players in the series, but Cole did not get out-played.”
Immediately after the Royals were eliminated, Reschny accepted an invite to join Team Canada at the IIHF Under-18 World Championship in Texas.
He was the overtime hero in a quarterfinal squeaker against Czechia, accepting a pass from close pal Keaton Verhoeff — the Royals teammates committed on the same day to North Dakota — and tucking a shot just inside the post on the blocker side. He finished the tourney with five goals, eight points and a plus-8 rating in five games and headed home with a gold medal.
“He was a key piece in the success we had, that’s for sure,” said former NHL centre Kyle Turris, who was part of Canada’s management group at U18s and described Reschny as “very smart” and “very cerebral.”
“He was phenomenal. He played incredible for us. He was an offensive driver, creating chances for himself and his teammates. And at that level, that’s hard to do, so adding him was really important for us. He helped lead the way offensively.”
‘He has his sights set’
You might have already spotted a ‘Reschny’ name-bar at a Calgary-area rink.
Austin Reschny, the oldest of five siblings from this farming family, is now in his sophomore season with the SAIT Trojans. He previously played three campaigns in the Alberta Junior Hockey League.
“Already a lot of people come up to me and say, ‘Hey, are you Cole’s brother?’” Austin, 22, said with a chuckle. “And it will probably be a little more this winter, too, I guess.”
He doesn’t mind that one bit.
Austin knows that his younger brother — the age gap is just a smidge less than four years — has been all-in on his dream since before he could drive himself to the rink, or from Macklin to Wainwright for a workout with Huxley & Co.
“He has been working towards this his whole life, ever since he was a little boy,” Austin said. “Any time anybody asked him what he wants to do for a living, he’d say, ‘I’m going to be a hockey player.’ He didn’t even consider anything else. There was never a doubt in his mind that he could do it.”
That determination is what immediately struck Brayden Toma, who coached Cole for two seasons in the Northern Alberta Xtreme prep program. While there, Reschny averaged an absurd 3.68 points per game in Canadian Sport School Hockey League action in 2021-22, prompting the Royals to select him third overall in the WHL Draft that spring.
“Sometimes, you’d talk to him and think he was 40 years old, and he was just a kid,” said Toma, now an assistant on the Kamloops Blazers’ bench staff. “He was so driven, almost like a Captain Serious. I know that’s what they call Jonathan Toews.
“Sometimes, I’d have to find extra ways to joke with him just to get a few more laughs in. I actually have family heritage in Macklin, so I used to tease him that we were probably cousins down the line. That usually got a chuckle out of him.
“He’s just so dedicated, and I think that’s why he decided to go to North Dakota,” Toma continued, referring to a decision that was big news in both WHL and NCAA hockey circles. “He just wants it so bad. He wants to be challenged. He wants to take the biggest steps he can consistently to follow his dream. He just … He has his sights set.”
Asked about his first impression of Reschny, who will be back in action this weekend against the rival Minnesota Golden Gophers, Fighting Hawks coach Dane Jackson offered a familiar assessment: “For an 18-year-old, he sure handles himself with a lot of presence.”
“Obviously, whenever guys make a jump, you never know exactly how the translation is going to go,” Jackson told Postmedia prior to the season. “Some of the things that I look for are not just the on-ice stuff. It’s more about how they’re going to handle the adversity and the challenges and all the new.
“A young man like Cole, he has special ability on the ice. His vision, his hockey sense and his poise with the puck are really special, in my opinion. That’s going to lead to good stuff on the ice, for sure. We know he will play a top role for us right away. But it’s more so handling the challenges and the pressure and all the praise that is heaped upon him.
“I know he’s a kid that is going to keep his feet on the ground and be humble and go to work and focus on the right things day-to-day, just because of that confidence and presence he has.”
On Canada’s world-junior radar
During development camp in July, a hat-trick of Flames prospects — each of them selected in the 2024 NHL Draft — were walking through the cafeteria seating area at WinSport’s Markin MacPhail Centre when one veered toward the windows that overlook the ice sheets.
“Is Reschny out there?” he wondered aloud. “I want to see him.”
For the next few minutes, all three stood among the spectators.
The thing about Reschny is he won’t blow you away with blinding speed — fellow first-rounder Cullen Potter is the burner in Calgary’s latest draft class — and doesn’t typically try to dipsy-doodle through a crowd.
Button, who has been Calgary’s head amateur scout for two-plus decades, described him as “a conscientious two-way player” with an “understated, efficient game” and a “sneaky quick release” on his shot.
His hockey sense is a major asset and the Flames believe any concern about his quickness will melt away as he builds more muscle.
“With Cole, it’s not flash,” said Button, who racked up roughly 20 viewings of Reschny during his draft season, starting at the Hlinka Gretzky Cup. “It’s just right play, right time, high-level plays and high execution.”
That recipe seems to be working for him.
Already angling for another opportunity to represent his country, Reschny made a positive impression on Canada’s brass at the world junior summer showcase, hitting the scoresheet in each of those three international friendlies.
When some of the returnees were scratched, he auditioned in a top-line role. He should be strongly considered for an invite to the annual holiday tournament, especially if he’s on a roll at North Dakota.
“That’s just the way it goes with him,” said Troy Walkington, who leaned on a 15-year-old Reschny to help power the Saskatoon U18 AAA Blazers to a provincial title in 2022-23, saying “he dragged our team into the fight in most games.”
“You talk about U-18s, you talk about perhaps he’s playing out of position or he’s playing down in the lineup … But by the end of the tournament, he was playing centre on the top line and he was playing on the top power-play unit.
“He’s a kid that you can trust and you can count on. He’ll accept whatever role you give to him. He might not be happy all the time in that role, especially if it’s a decreased role, but he’ll work his ass off to make sure he doesn’t stay there for very long.”
‘I think they hit a home run’
The next question is how long will Reschny stay at North Dakota and what sort of impact can he eventually have at the NHL level?
Huxley offers up a couple of intriguing comparables, including Brayden Point. That would be a dream outcome for the Flames, since Point — a third-round steal by the Tampa Bay Lightning in 2014 — has scored 40-plus goals in four separate campaigns. The Calgary-raised pivot is among the six players already named to Canada’s roster for the 2026 Winter Olympics.
“I believe he is the best 200-foot player in this draft — and that’s not a joke,” Huxley said after the Flames selected Reschny in June. “There are guys that are probably faster than him. There are guys that are bigger and stronger than him. There are guys that are maybe better playmakers. But he is very close to them in each of those things and I think his game transfers to the NHL very well.”
“I think the way the game is now, his game really suits the style of hockey that is played in the NHL,” Patrick agreed. “Can you win battles? Can you go to dirty areas? Can you hold on to pucks? And can you make plays in small areas or tight spaces when there’s not much room? He does all those things well.”
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The Flames’ most-trusted centres, Mikael Backlund and Nazem Kadri, are both in their mid-30s now, so there will be opportunity for Reschny to step into a significant role as soon as he’s ready.
Soucy, currently patrolling the blue line for the New York Rangers, may soon recognize this familiar face from those summer workouts in Wainwright and ask him what took so long.
Reschny doesn’t turn 19 until April, but with two teenagers — Matvei Gridin and Zayne Parekh — cracking Calgary’s opening roster this fall, you can understand why Flames fans are hoping they could be seeing this up-and-coming pivot even before the move to Scotia Place.
“The DNA of that kid is captain material someday,” said Huxley, who played 11 seasons as a minor-league tough guy, including some time with Calgary’s ECHL affiliate. “The Flames are getting a leader. I mean a leader in the room, in all three zones and just a guy that you want representing your organization. Because people will meet Cole and be like, ‘That is a very mature, very respectful, very good young man.’
“I think they hit a home run. I think they knocked it out of the park with him.”