The Kelowna Rockets have traded forward Tomas Soustal to the Edmonton Oil Kings in exchange for a fourth-round pick in the 2018 WHL bantam draft.
Soustal, who was entering his fourth season with the Rockets, was picked 60th overall by Kelowna in the 2014 CHL Import Draft.
With Carsen Twarynski returning to the team this week from the American Hockey League, the Rockets had one more 20-year-old on the roster than WHL rules permit. The club was also one player above the import limit and that made Soustal the odd man out.
“The number of overage players we can have is only three, and with Twarynski coming back, that gave us an extra guy,” said Rockets general manager Bruce Hamilton. “We also had three Europeans and we’re only allowed to carry two. We just felt we needed to go with the two younger European players.
“We feel this is a really good situation for Tomas to be going to Edmonton,” Hamilton added. “He’s going to a really nice city, and to a team that’s up and coming. He’s going to be counted on to score a lot of goals for them, and he’s going to be a very important part of their team.
“Unfortunately, it’s not that we wanted to make the trade, but we had to simply due to numbers.”
In 175 regular season games the Unicov, Czech Republic native tallied 47 goals and 66 assists for 113 points while boasting a +51 career +/- rating.
He also added 163 career PIMS. The 6’3 200lb skilled forward also collected 13 goals and 14 assists for 27 points in 54 post season games. Soustal also helped the Rockets win the Ed Chynoweth Cup in 2014-15.