The Cougars celebrate a goal scored over the weekend. Photo courtesy WHL

By Tommy Osborne

Prince George Cougars

Prince George Cougars welcome back players from NHL camps

Sep 25, 2024 | 4:56 PM

PRINCE GEORGE – Following a home opening weekend that saw the shorthanded Prince George Cougars impress with three out of four possible points, the Cougars are looking forward to getting even stronger as players start returning from NHL camps. Borya Valis and Bauer Dumanski are returning from Detroit Red Wings camp, Hunter Laing is returning from the Calgary Flames, and Viliam Kmec, fresh off of inking a three year deal, is returning from the Vegas Golden Knights.

“It’s great to see the NHL guys with big experience, I saw where the level is, I want to get to that level at some point,” Kmec said, on his experience in camp.

“Coming to the rink and a chef is making food for you was pretty surreal, I wasn’t expecting that. You definitely get treated like a king in there, and it’s unbelievable,” Valis said, when thinking of his “welcome to the NHL” moment.

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Having the opportunity to compete and practice at the highest level with NHL stars was a great learning opportunity, and Valis and Kmec hope to bring a lot of the lessons they learned back to the Cougars.

“I think the compete was crazy there, I mean, you have to be going full on all the time, and you’re going against Patrick Kane. You can’t be going 50% out there, so I think that’s a huge part. And I think the speed, and how they see the game was way faster,” Valis said.

“Everything is faster there, so you got to make decisions quicker, I want to bring that here,” Kmec added.

Valis is a five-year WHL veteran entering his second season with the Cougars, while Kmec is in year four with the team, so they’ll be expected to lead a team with several young players on it. Both players say they feel they learned how to be stronger leaders after seeing the best in the NHL lead their teams.

“It was pretty cool to watch them (Patrick Kane and Vladimir Tarasenko), how they’d start every drill and they’d always be vocal on the ice and off the ice and just watching them was huge for me and a huge learning experience,” Valis said.

“You can see it on the NHL guys, guys do the extra work every day. They come to the room, and they just focus on the hockey on me and I think that’s a good point to take with me,” Kmec said.

While NHL camp was certainly an incredibly exciting opportunity, both Valis and Kmec add they’re also excited to return to Prince George and prepare for what’s hopefully another season with championship aspirations.

“It’s probably the greatest thing that could happen, you know, sign and then come back and play with the the guys that I know for four years,” Kmec said, on returning after inking his three year deal.

“This hopefully will be the best year the Cougars have. We broke a lot of records last year, hopefully we’ll re-break them this year,” Valis said.

The Cougars will be on the road this weekend against the Vancouver Giants and Wenatchee Wild.

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