Jake Paterson Traded To The Kitchener Rangers

Michelle Thomas

• 3 min read Prospects

Early this week the Saginaw Spirit made a trade with the North Bay Battalion that involved, among other things, the acquisition of a young goalie. The transaction immediately put my prospect radar on high alert since the Spirit already had 2 goalies, including starter and overage goalie Jake Paterson. The OHL overage player trade deadline is today at noon, and a few minutes before the cut off, the Spirit announced that they have traded Paterson to the Kitchener Rangers. The Spirit receive Kitchener's 3rd Round pick in 2017 and their 2nd Round pick in 2018.

The Spirit were interested in trading Paterson early in the season and going with their 2 young goalies, since they're supposedly in the midst of a rebuild of sorts. Instead, they traded goalie Nikita Serebryakov and relied heavily on Paterson, with David Ovsjannikov backing him up. Saginaw has now traded away several roster players this season, including their Captain, and Paterson will play for an OHL team that's not the Spirit for the first time in his career.

Jake Paterson Regular Season
Season GP GA Mins Saves GAA SV% W L OTL SOL T SO
2014-15 24 82 1413 784 3.48 0.905 12 11 0 1 0 1
2013-14 45 143 2518 1379 3.41 0.906 24 18 2 0 0 2
2012-13 50 170 2893 1541 3.53 0.901 25 18 3 2 0 1
2011-12 42 129 2265 1219 3.42 0.904 18 18 0 3 0 1
2010-11 5 15 303 147 2.97 0.907 3 0 2 0 0 0
Total: 166 539 9392 5070 3.44 0.904 82 65 7 6 0 5
Jake Paterson Playoffs
Season GP GA Mins Saves GAA SV% W L OTL SOL T SO
2014 5 24 308 193 4.67 0.889 1 2 2 0 0 0
2013 4 21 235 129 5.36 0.86 0 3 1 0 0 0
2012 12 35 689 324 3.05 0.903 6 3 3 0 0 0
2011 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
Total: 21 80 1232 646 3.89 0.89 7 8 6 0 0 0

Paterson has always had a tough job in Saginaw, facing a lot of shots and often getting below average support from his team. Paterson is currently 11th in SV% in the OHL while facing the 7th most shots in the league. The Spirit currently sit in 3rd place in the West Division with 38 points and a 18-17-1-1 record. The Rangers are in 5th in the Midwest Division with 38 points and a 15-13-2-6 record.

I don't know yet where Paterson will fit in on the team and how involved a role he'll have because the Rangers now have 3 goalies on their roster as well. The other two goalies aren't overage players, so the Rangers have until tomorrow at noon to make a move (that can't involve any overage players). Matthew Greenfield and Dawson Carty have split time evenly for Kitchener and I have no indication which goalie they'll be looking to move. Paterson joins the Rangers with the best SV% of the 3 goalies and significantly more shots faced.

Name GP Min GA SO GAA W L OTL SOL SA SVS SAV%
1 Jake Paterson 24 1413 82 1 3.48 12 11 0 1 866 784 0.905
2 Matthew Greenfield 20 1029 61 0 3.56 8 7 1 3 480 419 0.873
3 Dawson Carty 21 1172 62 0 3.17 7 6 1 3 581 519 0.893
Empty Net 3 4 4

I hope the Rangers are better to Jake than Saginaw has been, and that he has a chance to show how good he really is. Rangers General Manager Murray Hiebert said in a radio interview (at the bottom of this article) that Paterson is an experienced goalie that everyone coveted and the Rangers see Paterson as kind of a key acquisition they needed in order to get the most out of their team. It sounds like the Rangers are pretty excited to get Paterson and I hope he'll be a great fit.

We'll keep you updated as any other news unfolds. Good luck in Kitchener, Patty!