For the first time in his life, Cole Sillinger had a moment of confusion on the bench this morning at the Blue Jackets morning skate.
“It’s kind of weird,” he said before the Jackets’ preseason game tonight at Carolina. “Everyone is saying, ‘Silly,’ and I’m like, ‘There’s two Sillys out here.'”
Cole is the top Silly on the Blue Jackets squad, having made a memorable debut a season ago with the team at 18 years old. But there’s another Silly in CBJ camp this year, as the Cleveland Monsters signed his older brother, Owen, to a contract late last season.
And tonight, for the first time in an organized game, the two brothers who are six years apart will be on the same bench, with both of them named to the roster that will take on the Hurricanes tonight in Raleigh.
“(This morning was the) first time I was on the ice with Owen in a team setting — never been in practice with him, never been in a game with him, obviously,” Cole said. “It’s weird, but it’s super cool. It will be a very special one tonight.
“My parents were just in town. Unfortunately they went home. I’m sure if they knew beforehand they would be making a flight to Carolina, but this will be incredible. I’m getting a lot of texts from my buddies, ‘You ‘Are you playing with Owen?’ and stuff like that. It’s going to be very exciting.”
The two have taken very different paths to the locker rooms at Nationwide Arena and, tonight, PNC Arena. The oldest of former NHL player Mike Sillinger’s three sons, Owen spent three seasons in the junior-level British Columbia Hockey League and then four with Bemidji State, where he posted 47 points in 39 games to be one of the top-scoring players in college. hockey a year ago.
He spent three of those seasons playing with the middle Sillinger brother, Lukas, who joined him in Penticton of the BCHL in 2018 and then with Bemidji State the past two seasons. Owen is now 25 and Lukas — who has transferred to Arizona State — is 22, with another three-year gap to Cole.
While Lukas and Owen dressed Cole in goaltender gear and fired pucks at him plenty of times when the Sillingers were growing up, the age difference helps explain why the three have never really played with each other in organized hockey.
But there’s also the fact that Cole, frankly, is a wunderkind. Neither Owen nor Lukas was drafted, but Cole went 12th overall to the Blue Jackets in the 2021 draft and then was the youngest player in the NHL a year ago, posting a 16-15-31 line as an 18-year-old that compares him quite favorably to other top draft picks at that age in past seasons.
“I’m so proud of him,” Owen said Monday. “He was in a very unique situation last year at the draft and making the team, making such a positive impact on the Blue Jackets last year, and he’s obviously going to do that again this year. He’s looking forward to it and working hard, and I’m so proud of him. He’s such a great person on the ice and off the ice as well. It’s awesome.”
Cole — who will be making his preseason debut after recovering from an upper-body injury suffered in the first practice of the OhioHealth Training Camp — has similar things to say about the family members that helped pave the way.
“I obviously wanted to be like my dad,” said Cole, who was actually born in Columbus in 2002 when Mike played for the Blue Jackets. “I have taken just little bits and pieces from each of them. I have always looked up to them, and I still look up to them. My brothers are my best friends — same with my dad. We’re all super close. It’s going to be a special one tonight.”
For Owen, training camp has been — and tonight’s game is — a chance to try to catch some eyes. Coming off that impressive campaign with Bemidji State a season ago, he signed with Cleveland at the end of last year and posted three goals and nine points in 17 games, and this camp has been his first with a pro team.
“It’s a great opportunity to showcase my skills, and I think I’ve earned this opportunity throughout camp,” he said. “I think that last month in Cleveland helped me get my legs under me and meet some of the staff and some of the players and build relationships with the coaches and management and stuff like that. I think I’m on solid footing, and I looking forward to playing tonight.”
Cole has already made history as the first legacy Blue Jacket, having followed in his father’s footsteps to play for Columbus. While the Russell brothers, Kris and Ryan, both played for Columbus, they didn’t do so at the same time, so perhaps the Sillingers will one day make history and suit up together in a regular-season game as well.
“Absolutely,” Owen said. “I’m honestly taking it day by day. I’m doing my best to stand out and make a positive impact on the team. I don’t want to look too far ahead, just do what makes myself successful.”
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