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2 Flames prospects are headed to the 2025 Memorial Cup
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Photo credit: ©Tav Morisson-Oilers Nation
Ryan Pike
May 17, 2025, 14:00 EDTUpdated: May 17, 2025, 12:38 EDT
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The 2024-25 season will be continuing for a pair of Calgary Flames prospects, despite the playoffs in their respective Canadian major junior leagues either being completed or winding down. Andrew Basha’s Medicine Hat Tigers and Etienne Morin’s Moncton Wildcats will be representing their respective leagues in the 2025 Memorial Cup tournament, starting next weekend.
If you’re unfamiliar with the structure of the Canadian Hockey League playoffs, they’re kind of wild.
Each team plays their own separate season and their own playoffs. But those playoffs are to qualify for the extra playoffs, the Memorial Cup. The three CHL leagues rotate hosting duties – this year’s the Quebec Maritimes Junior Hockey League’s turn, with the Rimouski Oceanic successfully bidding for hosting duties – and the three league champions join them.
So far two of the league champions have been decided: the London Knights won the Ontario Hockey League’s J. Ross Robertson’ Cup, while Medicine Hat won the Western Hockey League’s Ed Chynoweth Cup. Rimouski and Moncton are still in the process of playing for the QMJHL’s Gilles-Courteau Trophy, but because Rimouski qualifies for the tournament as host regardless of their playoff result, Moncton will be in no matter what as the other finalist.
The Wildcats currently lead the QMJHL’s championship series by a 3-1 margin, and they can capture the championship in Game 5 on Saturday night in Moncton. Since the CHL moved to a four-team model for the tournament in 1983 – the three league champions, plus a host team – the host team has also won their league’s championship seven times, but most of the time hosts take great pains to be competitive so they don’t get trounced in their home arena.
Last year’s tournament was hosted, and won, by Zayne Parekh and the Saginaw Spirit, just a month before the Flames drafted Parekh at ninth overall. The last time a Flames prospect won the Memorial Cup was back in 2022, when Jeremie Poirier and Yan Kuznetsov won with the Saint John Sea Dogs. (A WHL team hasn’t won since 2014.)

The prospects

If you’re unfamiliar with Morin and Basha, let’s tell you a few things about them.
Morin is a left-shot blueliner born in March 2005 and selected by the Flames in the second round of the 2023 NHL Draft. An alternate captain with Moncton in his fourth full season with that team, he’s had a really good season. He posted 58 points in 62 regular season games, and has followed that up with 20 points over 18 playoff games so far. He was voted the 10th-best Flames prospect in our summer 2024 rankings.
Basha is a left shot forward born in November 2005 and selected by the Flames in the second round of the 2024 NHL Draft. The 2024-25 season was his third full season with the Tigers (and fourth season overall), but his regular season ended in late December due to undergoing ankle surgery to deal with a recurring injury. He returned in time for the WHL Championship series against Spokane, though. He had 29 points over 23 regular season games, and posted another five points over five playoff games. He was voted the fifth-best Flames prospect in our summer 2024 rankings.
Both Morin and Basha are under NHL entry-level deals for the 2025-26 season and as 2005-born players, they’re eligible to play in the American Hockey League with the Calgary Wranglers. While they could both technically return to junior as over-age players, we could be seeing their major junior swan songs at the Memorial Cup tournament.

The schedule

Here’s how the Memorial Cup shapes up. All times are MT, and all games are on TSN.
  • Fri., May 23: Medicine Hat vs. Rimouski, 5 p.m.
  • Sat., May 24: Moncton vs. London, 4 p.m.
  • Sun., May 25: Rimouski vs. London, 4 p.m.
  • Mon., May 26: Moncton vs. Medicine Hat, 5 p.m.
  • Tue., May 27: London vs. Medicine Hat, 5 p.m.
  • Wed., May 28: Rimouski vs. Moncton, 5 p.m.
  • Thu., May 29: tie-breaker game, if necessary, to determine third place, 5 p.m.
  • Fri., May 30: semi-final (second vs. third), 5 p.m.
  • Sat., June 1: final (first vs. semi-final winner), 5 p.m.
We’ll have tons of updates on how the Flames’ prospects perform at the Memorial Cup as the tournament unfolds.

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