I'm not at all surprised by his departure. I'm guessing that the thinking is that del2 will put him in the shop window for del and swiss league. Fournier coming in as his direct replacement would make sense.
Translation from the PR.
Enormous speed, strong defensively and offensively, precise, hard shot: Bode Wilde is moving from the Cardiff Devils in Wales to EC Bad Nauheim in the DEL2. The defender is an NHL draft pick by the New York Islanders, who selected the talent in the second round 41st in 2018. In the summer, the North American newcomer, like Zach Kaiser, will receive a German passport.
“With Bode we are getting one of our dream players. I am very pleased that we have a stable two-way defender in our ranks. Despite his young age, he has already played 200 games in several top leagues. He will take on a lot of responsibility in our team,” said head coach Adam Mitchell.
Bode Wilde is 24 years old, 1.91 meters tall and a right-wing shooter. The offensive defender, born in Montreal, has great game intelligence, impresses with his confident puck handling and is expected to play a crucial role in the Red Devils' defense. His last coach in the British Elite Ice Hockey League (EIHL) was Peter Russell, who was once with Freiburg, Augsburg and Ravensburg in Germany.
Last season, Wilde initially stood on the ice for HC Banska Bystrica (with ex-devil Andrej Bires) before moving to Cardiff (with former EC cracks Mark Richardson and Jamie Arniel). On the British island, the defender recorded 31 points (seven goals, 24 assists) from 40 games.
“My family is from Germany, so I always wanted to live here, especially because of the great leagues you can play in. “I’m looking forward to getting to know the boys, playing my style of ice hockey and helping the team win in any way I can,” said newcomer Bode Wilde.
During his time in the Canadian junior league OHL (2018/19), he attracted the attention of scouts with an impressive 70 points in 62 games for the Saginaw Spirit. Wilde started his professional career with the Bridgeport Sound Tigers, the AHL farm team of the New York Islanders. His first European station was called Västerviks IK in Sweden's 2nd league, the “Hockey Allsvenskan”. He was then under contract with the Atlanta Gladiators (ECHL) alongside Cody Sylvester.
“We have worked very intensively over the last few weeks on the successor to Kevin Schmidt and are convinced that we have found a very good solution with Bode Wilde. He fits our team because we will have a North American-influenced team,” says managing director Andreas Ortwein.
