After a great silver medal performance for Team Canada, Tampa Bay Lightning prospect Anthony Cirelli has been traded from the OHL’s Oshawa Generals to the Erie Otters. In return the Generals received Allan McShane, a high-end rookie who so far has put up 23 points in 33 games as a 16 year old, as well as six draft picks: Erie’s 4th in 2018, Erie’s 2nd in 2022, Erie’s 2nd in 2023, a conditional 6th in 2019, and a conditional 2nd in 2024. Yes, a draft pick for a kid who’s only 8 years old right now.
Erie is serious about making a run to win the OHL Championship and the national junior hockey title, the Memorial Cup, this year after falling short the past few seasons. General Manager Dave Brown had this to say about the Otters trades and what it means going forward:
“We owe it to this group to make a serious run,” Brown said. “We see this as a unique opportunity that doesn’t come along very often. We’re going to do whatever we can to put the finishing touches and ice the cake and see what happens.”
Oshawa is bidding to host the 100th Memorial Cup tournament in 2018, so they need to show the CHL that they’ll have a competitive team next year, and with Cirelli most likely to head to Syracuse next season, they wanted to load up on picks and prospects, which they’ll use to stock up the team next season.
Anthony Cirelli was targeted by the Otters for this experience going deep into the post season. He’s hailed as Oshawa’s Memorial Cup hero after leading the team to victory in 2015, but also to add another high-scoring forward to their line up.
Cirelli has 33 points in 25 games for the Generals so far this season, which would see him fall to seventh on the Otters scoring list, which includes Taylor Raddysh (61pts in 28 games), Dylan Strome (16 in 7), and the OHL’s leading scorer Alex DeBrincat (65 in 32).
New teammate Dylan Strome had this to say about Cirelli at the World Juniors:
Love this quote from Dylan Strome on Anthony Cirelli: “I played against him in minor midget & didn’t even know who he was …” pic.twitter.com/tCNzZH1lX2
— Mark Masters (@markhmasters) January 5, 2017
This is a great chance to see Cirelli add another couple trophies to his case, and the former Generals captain will do all he can to make sure that happens.
