Vancouver Canucks centre prospect Riley Patterson wasn’t in junior hockey limbo for very long.
The Barrie Colts dealt Patterson to the Niagara IceDogs on Wednesday afternoon for five OHL Draft selections, led by a 2026 second rounder. Barrie had made it public on Monday that Patterson, 19, wanted a move and wasn’t going to be attending their training camp this week as a result. He had played the last two years with Barrie.
“We didn’t want it to drag on. Not for Riley’s sake,” Colts general manager Marty Williamson told the media. “Getting the trade done and getting him into camp was important for us. It took a little while for somebody to step up with the right amount of picks, but I’m glad Niagara did it.”
The 6-foot, 194-pound Patterson was a fourth-round pick by the Canucks in the 2024 NHL Draft, coming off a 29-goal, 62-point rookie season with Barrie. He had 25 goals and 59 points in 64 regular season games last season.
Krys Barch, 45, who was a feisty winger for eight seasons in the NHL, is Niagara’s first-year head coach. Up front, the team features Ryan Roobroeck, 17, who’s pegged as a possible top-five pick in next summer’s NHL Draft after putting up 41 goals and 87 points last season. The IceDogs forward group also includes Kevin He, 19, and Ethan Czata, 18, who are signed prospects of the Winnipeg Jets and Tampa Bay Lightning, respectively.
The IceDogs are coming off a tumultuous 2024-25. The OHL hired a Toronto law firm to conduct a cultural review of the team, following multiple complaints of inappropriate behaviour involving team staff.
Head coach Ben Boudreau was fired in May. He had three years remaining on his contract. He’s the son of former Canucks coach Bruce Boudreau.
Niagara finished 29-31-4-4, which was good enough for seventh place in the OHL’s Eastern Conference. They lost in the first round of the playoffs to in five games to, odd enough, Patterson and the Colts.
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