Koch SUPERU – Change the Way You Grow
Dave Leaderhouse
The Melville Millionaires might have been aided by the loan of a couple of players from the Western Hockey League’s Portland Winterhawks to start the 2020-21 Saskatchewan Junior Hockey League regular season, but the play of several new young recruits also had the team moving in a positive direction before play was suspended in November due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
One of those young prospects is Chase Bertholet, a 17-year-old forward from The Pas, Man. The 5-foot-11, 175-pound Bertholet collected a pair of assists on opening weekend and followed that up with another helper in his next outing to post three points in his first six games at the Junior “A” level.
A sixth-round selection of the Millionaires in the 2018 SJHL bantam draft – he was also picked in the fifth round of the WHL’s bantam lottery by the Red Deer Rebels that same year – Bertholet spent the last two seasons grooming his skills with the Prince Albert Mintos of the Saskatchewan Midget AAA Hockey League. In 82 games with the Mintos, Bertholet averaged nearly a point-per-game notching 28 goals and setting up 51 others, but at the 2018 Mac’s Midget tournament in Calgary he really displayed his skills potting four goals and assisting on four others in four games.
Like his talented temporary teammates Reece Newkirk and Jaydon Dureau, the aforementioned loaners from Portland, Bertholet also has a bit of WHL experience on his resume as he was called up by the Winnipeg Ice for nine games last year where he registered one point.
Bertholet’s attraction to numerous junior scouts undoubtedly came in 2017-18 when in 36 games with the Norman Wolves he posted 68 points including 30 goals. His play since then has only enhanced his appeal and Melville will definitely benefit from his addition to the roster.
It has been a couple of years since the Millionaires last competed in the playoffs, but with young talent like Bertholet bolstering the line-up the prospect of claiming one of the eight post-season spots is a distinct possibility not for just this year, but for several years in the future.
