Former NHL Draft lottery pick Cutter Gauthier has been traded to the Anaheim Ducks by the Philadelphia Flyers in exchange for Jamie Drysdale and a second-round pick.

Gauthier, considered a top NHL prospect who is currently playing NCAA hockey for Boston College with 23 points in 17 games this season, was traded because he wouldn’t ‘sign, train or communicate’ with the Flyers.

The player refused to meet with Flyers GM Danny Briere or President of Hockey Operations for Keith Jones when they flew to Sweden last month to watch the 19-year-old lead the United States to gold medal glory at the recent World Junior Championship.

A year after they drafted him, Gauthier told Philadelphia he did not intend on joining the team which has now led to a blockbuster trade involving fellow starlet Jamie Drysdale – who was selected with the sixth overall pick in the 2020 draft.

“It was a long time coming,” Briere said. “It’s been going on for a while. We tried to give him space. We tried to get in touch with him many times. He would not communicate … so at some point, we had to make a decision, and we thought with what happened just a few days ago, this was probably the time to get the highest value.”

Some of the timeline we know about the Cutter Gauthier trade saga …

▪️Drafted No. 5 overall by the Flyers in July 2022

▪️Informed the Flyers at the May 2023 World Championships he did not want to play for them

▪️Flyers attempted to acquire the No. 5 pick in the June 2023 NHL… pic.twitter.com/uZn9Kspm3n

— B/R Open Ice (@BR_OpenIce) January 9, 2024

“It was to try to protect the kid,” Briere said. “We were hoping that at some point he would change his mind. He had already changed his mind. He looked at us at the draft and told us he was built to be a Flyer, wanted to be a Flyer, and then a few months later, told us that he didn’t want to be a Flyer, didn’t want to play for the Flyers.

“So in our mind at first, we said, ‘We have to protect him, because if he changes his mind again, it’s going to be tough for him to put the uniform on.’ But when we realized that he refused to talk to us now, it’s been months and he didn’t want to be a Flyer, didn’t want to be in Philadelphia, it was time to make it happen.”