- All three Ruck brothers opened a WHL game together for the first time Tuesday in Lethbridge
- Liam Ruck scored a hat trick and Markus put up a goal and two assists in a 5-3 Medicine Hat win
- Read below for Landon Ruck’s assist, the Penguins connection and what he said before camp
All three Ruck brothers finally got on the ice together, and Liam marked the occasion with a hat trick.
Liam, Markus and youngest brother Landon opened Tuesday night’s preseason game in Lethbridge on the same shift, the first time the Medicine Hat Tigers had ever run all three of them out together. Medicine Hat won 5-3.
Liam did most of the damage. He sniped a power-play goal at 13:40 of the first, added another at 13:33 of the second and finished the hat trick with an empty-netter at 19:57, per the Tigers. Markus assisted on both of the first two.
Landon got his moment in the third. He set up Markus on a power-play goal at 5:31, which made it a Ruck-to-Ruck feed on a night the youngest one had been hoping for since camp opened.
That was the whole ask. Days earlier he had told James Tubb of the Medicine Hat News what he wanted out of his first Tigers camp, and he did not hedge.
“Whether it’s me playing forward or defence, I hope to be out there with them for an actual preseason game, it’d mean the world.”
He got it in the town where his dad played his junior hockey. Tubb flagged that wrinkle before puck drop:
Derek Ruck played three seasons for the Hurricanes and 206 WHL games in all.
The twins belong to Pittsburgh now. The Penguins took Liam 22nd overall and Markus 39th at the 2026 draft after the pair finished as the top two scorers in the WHL last season. Markus led the league with 108 points and Liam was right behind at 104.
Their runway opened up once Gavin McKenna and Ryder Ritchie left Medicine Hat. Both twins are committed to North Dakota starting in 2027-28.
Landon is nowhere near that stage yet. The 2011-born defenceman went 171st to the Tigers in May’s WHL Prospects Draft, he isn’t eligible for a full WHL season, and he heads back to Okanagan Hockey Academy this fall.
He made the one night count anyway. One assist, one shift to start the game, three Rucks.
