The View from Section 2, January 6, 2026

Wolves Make Major Deal with Spitfires

By T Puck

The Sudbury Wolves began a roster overhaul Monday in a significant trade with the Windsor Spitfires.

Going to the Spitfires are 19-year-old team captain Nathan Villeneuve and overage player Alex Pharand.

The return for the Wolves is 18-year-old centre Jean-Christoph Lemieux and 8 draft picks.

Let us look at the Windsor side of this transaction first. The Spitfires are receiving a bona fide OHL star in Nathan Villeneuve, a player that almost any other team in the league would love to add to their lineup. Villeneuve will not be tasked with the responsibility of being a front-line player, but he will certainly fit into the top-six or the top-nine of the deep Windsor forward core.

T Puck will tell the story of Nathan Villeneuve one last time. In 2022, T Puck opined that Sudbury should draft Villeneuve with their first-round pick, third overall. The comment that was made at the time was, "Nathan Villeneuve is a player that can do everything for the team that needs everything." 

Owner Dario Zulich read the blog, and he called T Puck some very uncomplimentary things on the telephone that cannot be reproduced here. T Puck was taken aback with the hostile response.

About three hours later, T Puck received another call from Dario Zulich. Zulich indicated that the Wolves were going to draft Nathan Villeneuve if he was available, third overall. Frankly, T Puck was not surprised.

The Dario Zulich era has been marked by first-round picks that have underachieved for the most part. Quinton Byfield was a notable exception.

Fortunately for Wolves fans, Nathan Villeneuve lived up to his billing. He came to Sudbury, and he did what T Puck said he would do for the Sudbury Wolves. He had 85 goals and 185 points in 196 games. He did what was necessary to help the Sudbury Wolves win. He was a leader on and off the ice. Villeneuve has incredible intangible value. He plays the game with passion, energy and intensity. Windsor fans will love Villeneuve in no time.

Alex Pharand came to the Wolves in a 2022 trade with the Hamilton Bulldogs. In 270 games with the Wolves, the former first-round pick recorded 67 goals and 97 assists. He had his good moments, but his career was plagued with inconsistency and lengthy production droughts.

Pharand is a very experienced player, and he will add even more size to a large Windsor lineup. He has been playing well lately, and he could surprise with his production being around a lot of quality players.

The marquee piece coming back to Sudbury is Jean-Christoph Lemieux, an exciting second-year player. He is 5'11" tall and he weighs 176 pounds. In 33 games with Windsor this season, Lemieux has scored 10 goals and he has added eight assists. At a minimum, Lemieux should be a regular contributor to the Sudbury offense. He may flourish with more ice time, and it is not inconceivable that he could produce at close to a point a game pace in Sudbury next season. He is a C rated prospect for the upcoming 2026 NHL draft. This means that it is possible that Lemieux could be drafted in the fifth, sixth or seventh round of the NHL draft.

The draft picks that the Wolves received are a 2027 second-round pick belonging to the Ottawa 67's, a 2028 second-round pick belonging to the Spitfires, a third-round pick belonging to the Peterborough Petes in 2026 (the upcoming draft), third-round picks in 2028 belonging to the Spitfires and the Oshawa Generals, respectively, a fifth-round pick in 2028 belonging to the Spitfires, a fourth round pick in 2029 belonging to the Spitfires and a 2029 fifth-round pick belonging to the Spitfires.

Let us analyse this trade from three perspectives.

First and foremost, owner Dario Zulich has made it known that he wants the Wolves to make the playoffs this season. Right now, the Wolves are tied with the Brampton Steelheads for the final playoff spot in the Eastern Conference with 31 points. Last place Oshawa is 11 points in arrears of both teams. Although Oshawa could surprise, it seems likely that Sudbury and Brampton will be battling for the final playoff spot in the Conference down the stretch. This looks like a battle that could go down to the wire. It is quite conceivable that the Wolves could make the playoffs, especially given that import Adam Nemec will soon be joining the team. He is an exciting player, and he is a B rated NHL draft pick for the upcoming draft.

There is a downside risk, however. If the Wolves do not make the playoffs, they will fall into the OHL Draft Lottery, and although they could win the lottery, they could fall as fourth. Right now, the Wolves are tied for 16th overall in the standings. It is possible that the Wolves could improve by a place or two in the overall rankings. Even if they are not in the draft lottery, Sudbury will receive a high pick.

The second question to be examined is whether the Wolves received fair market value for Nathan Villeneuve and Alex Pharand?

This is an intriguing question. On Monday, the Kingston Frontenacs dealt forward Jacob Battaglia to the Flint Firebirds for 8 draft picks. The package for Battaglia included three second-round draft picks, including a 2026 pick and two 2029 picks. The package also included a third-round pick in 2027, two fourth-round picks in 2027, a sixth-round pick in 2028 and a fifth-round pick in 2029.

Jacob Battaglia has 92 goals and 209 points in 237 OHL games.

Battaglia has 27 points in 36 games this season. Nathan Villeneuve has 44 points in 28 games this season.

In the mind of T Puck, Nathan Villeneuve is clearly superior to Jacob Battaglia in all respects at this point in his career. The intangibles comparables between the players is not even close.

Nathan Villeneuve has averaged 0.95 points per game in his OHL career and Jacob Battaglia has averaged 0.88 points per game in his OHL career.

Let us look at the Pharand versus Lemieux comparison. Pharand has 26 points in 37 games. He is averaging 0.70 points per game. Lemieux is averaging 0.55 points per game.

So far this season, Pharand has outperformed Lemieux.

The wild card in this comparison is that Lemieux will likely be with the Wolves for at least half a season. T Puck searched whether Lemieux has an NCAA commitment, and did not find anything. It is likely that Lemieux is in Sudbury for the next 1.5 seasons.

T Puck does not see Jean-Christoph Lemieux coming close to the production of Nathan Villeneuve as a 19-year-old player.

Let us examine this transaction from the perspective of the package of draft picks acquired by the Wolves. For purposes of comparison, let us look at the draft picks acquired by Kingston in the Jacob Battaglia transaction.

Before this trade, the Wolves did not have any 2026, 2027 or 2028 second-round draft picks. After this transaction, the Wolf have acquired second-round draft picks in 2027 and 2028.

The glaring omission in this transaction is at the Sudbury Wolves did not acquire a 2026 second-round draft pick. This is a key asset for the team going forward. This sends an ominous sign to Wolves fans that Sudbury is likely to punt on the 2026-2027 season.

A third-round pick in 2026 that the Wolves received is not comparable to a 2026 second-round pick.

Kingston acquired a 2026 second-round pick which will be of immediate help to them this season.

The additional second-round picks from both transactions cancel themselves out. The Wolves received a 2027 and a 2028 second-round pick and Kingston received two 2029 second-round picks.

Kingston also received more immediate help in the fact that they received three 2027 draft picks.

The Wolves received more help than Kingston did in 2028. Kingston received much more help than the Wolves did in 2029.

In the mind of T Puck, the Sudbury Wolves did not receive a comparable draft package to the picks acquired by the Kingston Frontenacs. They are hoping that Jean-Christoph Lemieux will make up the difference. This might be a risky proposition.

It is insulting to the Sudbury fan base that they will have to wait two seasons to determine whether the team will actually reap some dividends from this transaction.

This is a classic Rob Papineau transaction.

Rob Papineau misread the market at the 2025 Trade Deadline by trading three second-round picks and other assets in return for one-half season of Henry Mews and Noah Roberts. He emptied his draft capital stockpile by doing so.

Every General Manager in the league knew that Rob Papineau has very few assets to trade. This is not a good position when you are forced to make a transaction to make amends for your missteps of the previous season.

This season, significant trades started happening in the OHL in late October. Prices were better in late October, in the sense that sellers received more generous trade packages than they are receiving now. Put another way, the trade of Nathan Villeneuve and Alex Pharand would have received a greater return for Sudbury if they had made this transaction earlier.

Rob Papineau did not properly read the trade market again this season. He waited far too long before making a transaction, and the result was that he did not receive full value for his players.

The result of this is that the Sudbury Wolves are not as good a team today as they were yesterday, and the immediate future looks even more bleak.

Owner Dario Zulich sent Rob Papineau to the OHL Trade store with a toonie, and he asked him to return with a loonie.

Instead, Rob Papineau came back with $0.85. The Windsor Spitfires by comparison went to the store with a loonie, and they returned with $1.15.

If T Puck was to grade this deal, he would give the Spitfires a B and the Wolves a D.

Past mistakes are heavily punished at the OHL Trade Store, and once again, it is the fans of the Sudbury Wolves that have to bear the consequences of the short sightedness of Rob Papineau.