When the Vegas Golden Knights parted with Zach Whitecloud in a deal to acquire Rasmus Andersson from the Calgary Flames, they didn\u2019t just lose a good player\u2013 they also lost a man with deep roots in the Las Vegas community.<\/p>\n
On Thursday, Whitecloud will take the ice at T-Mobile Arena wearing road whites. After playing 368 games in a Golden Knights uniform, he had one word to describe how it feels coming to Las Vegas as a visitor: weird.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a little weird,\u201d he admitted. \u201cIt\u2019s just weird, right? I spent seven or eight years here, created a lot of lifelong relationships here, not just with the team but in the community. I\u2019m mainly excited to get back, see everyone, play in front of that building, and have some fun with it.<\/p>\n
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\u201cIt\u2019s going to be weird going through the gameday routine and being on the other side of it,\u201d continued Whitecloud. \u201cYeah, it\u2019ll be different, and it\u2019ll be weird. But it\u2019ll be exciting for my friends and family, and exciting [for me] to play against those guys.\u201d<\/p>\n
The trade caught Whitecloud by surprise, but he\u2019s thriving in Calgary. He has been a rock and a pillar of stability for a young Flames team in the midst of a rebuild. He has six assists through 23 games and plays over 24 minutes on most nights.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s been good,\u201d said Whitecloud. \u201cFirst and foremost, the guys and everyone in the organization did a fantastic job of making me feel at home pretty quickly\u2026 The coaches and players made me feel pretty comfortable coming in, made me feel part of the family.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a business on the other side of it, too, and we all get that,\u201d Whitecloud continued. \u201cI\u2019m excited for my opportunity in Calgary. I\u2019ve made a good adjustment here, met a lot of new guys, and the new fanbase has been great too.\u201d<\/p>\n
In 2017, the Golden Knights signed Whitecloud as an undrafted free agent out of Bemidji State University. He went on to spend the next nine years of his life as a part of the organization. In 2023, Whitecloud helped the Golden Knights win the Stanley Cup, playing in all 22 games and scoring a game-winning goal in the Final.<\/p>\n
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\u201cI\u2019m obviously grateful for my time here,\u201d Whitecloud began. \u201cThere\u2019s not one bad thing to say about Las Vegas, its people, its community, the fans, the organization, everyone that helped me get to the NHL and be a regular here and try to help the team win.<\/p>\n
\u201cEvery time I come back here in the future will be exciting for me,\u201d finished Whitecloud. \u201cThis will always be home in my heart. It\u2019s the place I first broke into the NHL and learned how to win, and eventually won with this group.\u201d<\/p>\n
Because the trade happened so suddenly, Whitecloud didn\u2019t have the chance to say a proper goodbye to all of the people in his day-to-day life. Now, he has that opportunity.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was pretty quick when the day came,\u201d said Whitecloud. \u201cBeing Canadian, I was able to get on a plane and jump right out [to Calgary]… I didn\u2019t really get to say goodbye to a lot of the staff and the people behind the scenes who really make all these things go around and keep us playing. Being able to see a lot of them today was pretty emotional, to be honest with you. [There are] a lot of guys that take care of the players and make sure that we can be ourselves and be the pros that we are, and people don\u2019t really see that\u2026 Just being able to give them a hug and see them was really great.\u201d<\/p>\n
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Whitecloud went to dinner with a group of his former teammates on Wednesday night.<\/p>\n
\u201cAll the guys have been great,\u201d said Whitecloud. \u201cThey were all excited to see me, and me likewise. I got to catch up and see how everyone\u2019s families are doing, how all the kids are doing, and make sure everyone\u2019s good.\u201d<\/p>\n
As is tradition, Whitecloud knows that there\u2019s an emotional tribute video in store for him, and he\u2019s ready for it. But he\u2019s also ready to continue processing the emotions stemming from the trade.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think, once this game goes by, I can kind of let everything go a little bit,\u201d he said. \u201cNot that I\u2019ll forget everything\u2026 I spent a lot of time here and built a lot of roots here. Everything\u2019s weird, everything\u2019s exciting. There are a lot of emotions. Happy, sad, grateful, appreciative\u2013 a lot of words come to mind.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When the Vegas Golden Knights parted with Zach Whitecloud in a deal to acquire Rasmus Andersson from the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":540036,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5129],"tags":[26,149,5317,5,1326,4,3327,74,39,5316,3708],"class_list":{"0":"post-540035","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-vegas-golden-knights","8":"tag-calgary-flames","9":"tag-golden-knights","10":"tag-goldenknights","11":"tag-hockey","12":"tag-las-vegas","13":"tag-nhl","14":"tag-rasmus-andersson","15":"tag-vegas","16":"tag-vegas-golden-knights","17":"tag-vegasgoldenknights","18":"tag-zach-whitecloud"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116345876550337849","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/540035","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=540035"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/540035\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/540036"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=540035"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=540035"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=540035"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}