Meet Journal Star senior sports writer and columnist Dave Eminian
Journal Star reporter Dave Eminian covers Bradley Braves basketball and Peoria Rivermen hockey.
PEORIA — Dillan Bentley continued climbing in his hockey dream Thursday, landing a step away from the National Hockey League.
The Peoria native signed a two-year, one-way contract with Laval of the American Hockey League. That means he’s under contract to Laval for the 2026-27 and 2027-28 seasons and will be paid his AHL salary even if sent to a lower pro level.
He could make his pro debut with Laval, the class-AAA primary farm club of the storied Montreal Canadiens, if they choose to bring him in for a look this spring.
Bentley is believed to be just the third Peoria-born or former Peoria Youth Hockey Association product to reach the game’s class-AAA level.
“Everything kind of happened so fast,” Bentley said. “They are high up in their division, they haven’t told me if or when I’m going to play yet.
“But I just want to see how far can I go, how can I progress with the tools that I have. As you go through the game, that tool kit grows. Through my whole career I started as a low-end guy, been up and down, and having that experience of learning about everything is an important piece.
“… It really comes down to this: If I take a day off, I truly do miss the game. And that has to do a lot with the success I’m having.”
Bentley is a 6-foot-4, 195-pound wing whose 14 goals in 33 games during his final season at UMass-Lowell led the team this season.
He was an assistant captain there. Bentley grew up playing in the Peoria Youth Hockey Association, where he started out as a house league player.
Former Peoria Rivermen winger Kevin Lune, a PYHA coach who saw Bentley in that house league, convinced his parents to let their son try travel team hockey.
He was coached and mentored along the way by Peoria Rivermen head coach Jean-Guy Trudel, whose impact was incalculable.
‘I couldn’t be here without him’
The biggest impact on Bentley’s hockey career has been Trudel, who has long been deeply involved in the PYHA and junior hockey Peoria Mustangs as well as building the SPHL Peoria Rivermen into a two-time champion.
Trudel coached Bentley along the youth levels, and later recruited him to the Mustangs NA3HL junior team. He scored 30 goals in 46 games under Trudel in 2019-20.
That pushed him up the ladder the next season to New Mexico of the NAHL. Four years at UMass-Lowell followed, and throughout, Benson was a frequent visitor to the Rivermen and Trudel in Peoria.
“I couldn’t be here without him,” Bentley said. “I can’t say enough about him, the way he took me in, as did (former Peoria-born captain Alec Hagaman) and other guys. I grew up playing for him, and Tristan (Trudel’s son, former Rivermen winger Tristan Trudel), and I were friends.
“I didn’t know then how much of a genius Jean-Guy Trudel is. No one understands it as much as I do. No one will truly understand how lucky they were to have him in their life. He’s family now. I would go over to their house, and in the basement he had a closet filled with old stuff from his pro days. I thought it was so cool. It inspired me, I found a bigger passion for the game through him.
“Anything in my hockey career, he’s who I talk with. How much he has done for me and how much I learned from him. You can’t teach the love for the game that he has.”
Bentley is wrapping up his college days at UMass-Lowell, where the seniors were just asked to write a summary of their experience at the program.
It gave the player time to reflect, and time to get his head around the fact he’s going to start a pro career with a Laval team that is 36-18-5 and in first place in the AHL’s North Division.
“I was able to think about the journey a lot,” Bentley said. “One thing that comes to mind is doing it because I loved it, not because of anything else. Still do. I was just trying to become the best player I could be. I just wanted to be as best as I could on and off the ice.”
An exclusive club
Bentley will join a rare group of players when he makes his AHL debut.
Few Peoria-born, or Pekin-born, or Peoria Youth Hockey Association products have gone on to the class-AAA level or beyond in pro hockey.
PYHA product Tage Thompson is an NHL star and passed through the AHL.
Ric Olson played for the Peoria Prancers in 1982-83 in the old IHL, then a class-AAA league.
Pekin brothers Butch and Karson Kaebel played for the Peoria franchise in the old IHL as well, after it was re-named the Rivermen, and the latter made it to the AHL as well.
Pekin-born defenseman Bryce Aneloski reached the AHL.
Bentley joins that exclusive list. There are others who were drafted by NHL teams but never moved up beyond class-AA pro hockey.
“I’m so proud of Dillan, he’s everything you want in a hockey player,” Trudel said. “He’s completely dedicated to the process of growth, he’s become a great leader, works harder than everyone else.
“He keeps fighting and believing through all the adversity that his career has brought his way. He loves the game, and he’s being rewarded.”
Dave Eminian is the Journal Star sports columnist, and covers Bradley men’s basketball, the Rivermen and Chiefs. He writes the Cleve In The Eve sports column for pjstar.com. He can be reached at 686-3206 or [email protected]. Follow him on X.com @icetimecleve.
