The New Westminster Salmonbellies made Carter Dickson their first-round pick in last Sunday’s B.C. midget lacrosse draft.
The junior Salmonbellies took the 6-3 Semiahmoo lefthander third overall as the future considerations in the Patrick Thornhill/Nathan Marken trade with Port Coquitlam last month.
Dickson is the younger brother of Adam Dickson, who last season led the intermediate A Salmonbellies in scoring with 27 goals and 50 points.
Prior to the draft, New West completed a deal with Delta that saw Quinn McKay return to Queen’s Park Arena as part of the futures in last year’s trade deadline deal that brought Cody Nass and Eli McLaughling to the junior ’Bellies for their Minto Cup run.
The junior A Burnaby Lakers began their long road back to respectability after last season’s 1-20-0 season, picking up three Team B.C. players at the midget draft.
The Lakers, which last month dealt their first overall pick to the Delta Islanders in exchange for four players, picked up an additional six players in the second and third rounds of the midget round held in Port Coquitlam on Sunday.
With their second-round selections Burnaby took offensively skilled Mason Pomeroy from Semiahmoo ninth overall.
The junior Lakers then took provincial teammembers Davis Goodman from Semiahmoo, Chase Preti-Pearsall from Vancouver and goalie Thomas Hankins from Maple Ridge with their next three of four picks.
Burnaby also picked up Damon Prince from North Vancouver with its final pick of the second round and Parker Colley from Pitt Meadows with its 22nd pick in the third round.
“We upped our skill level and our size,” said incoming Burnaby junior general manager Brad Hara.
Hara also convinced former Burnaby Cablevision Minto Cup champion and New Westminster junior A head coach Brad Parker to take over the coaching duties behind the Burnaby bench.
“We’re going to turn this thing around,” said Hara. “Everybody (I’ve talked to) wants to make Burnaby better.”
Hara also put another piece in place towards righting the Lakers’ ship, installing Julian Kolb, who coached the Toronto Beaches to a provincial title in the Ontario junior B league last season, as the new head coach of the intermediate A team in Burnaby.
In the Dec. 12 trade that gave Delta the No. 1 pick in the midget draft, Burnaby received in return 20-year-old Islanders goalie David Mather and runner Randy Jones, as well as defender Nick Kapusty and first-year Ryan Vogrig, who had eight goals and 22 points in just 11 junior games in 2013.
Vogrig is the older brother of Tyler Vogrig, the first overall pick of the junior Lakers in last season’s midget draft. The younger Vogrig lit up the B.C. intermediate A league with a league-best 69 goals and 119 points last season.
In another move, Hara also sent Burnaby junior goalie Jack Woodhouse to the Port Coquitlam Saints in exchange for runner Corey Wong and a swap of third-round draft picks in 2015. Wong had eight goals in 16 games with the Saints last year.
