Gaudette in NHL after stellar college season
Hobey Baker nominee makes pro debut with Canucks against visiting Oilers
Vancouver Canucks VANCOUVER centre Adam Gaudette, one of the finalists for the Hobey Baker Award as the NCAA’s top player alongside Boston Bruins winger Ryan Donato and Finnish forward Henrik Borgstrom, who just signed with the Florida Panthers, got into his first NHL game against the Edmonton Oilers Thursday night.
Matt Benning played one season with Gaudette at Northeastern University in Boston when the Oilers defenceman was a college junior and Gaudette was coming in as a freshman.
“I texted him Wednesday and told him to keep his head up,” Benning said jokingly.
Benning knew early on that Gaudette, a fifth-round draft pick of the Canucks, had the right stuff with the puck on his stick.
Not only were Benning and Gaudette, now 21, on that 201516 Northeastern team but so was winger Zach Aston-Reese of the Pittsburgh Penguins, Dylan Sikura, who just signed with Chicago, and John Stevens, son of L.A. Kings coach John Stevens.
“Gaudette was always around the net. He’s a dynamic player. He got 30 goals this year and that’s really good when you consider you only play 34 regular season games. He’s a shooter,” said Benning.
Gaudette, wearing No. 88 in the NHL, is tickled to be one of the final three for the Hobey Baker. Donato went to Harvard and Borgstrom to Denver University
“It’s the best award in college hockey,” Gaudette said.
Jimmy Vesey (Rangers, Harvard), Jack Eichel (Sabres, Boston University) and Johnny Gaudreau (Flames, Boston College) won it in 2016, 2015 and 2014.
Other winners include Vegas general manager George McPhee (Bowling Green, 1982), Ryan Miller (Michigan State, 2001) and Paul Kariya (Maine, 1993).
The signing of Gaudette and getting his first NHL taste is the big story here.
“How does it feel to overshadow (Connor) McDavid?” he was asked playfully.
“Uh, I don’t know about that. He’s got 102 points. But it’s pretty cool to be able to play my first game against one of the best players in the world. I’m sure I’ll be in awe watching him out there,” said Gaudette, who was a communications major at Northeastern.
GOAL MOUTH
McDavid went into the Canucks game with 40 goals, five back of Alex Ovechkin in the race for the Maurice Richard trophy as the NHL’s top sniper.
“You think you can catch Ovie?” McDavid was asked following the morning skate.
“No, no, no, I don’t think so,” said McDavid, looking like he’d been asked the dumbest question this side of: Why do hockey players wear jocks?
With a league-leading 31 evenstrength goals, McDavid does have more than Ovechkin’s 30.
Petr Klima was the last Oilers player to hit 40, doing it late in the
1990-91 season.
“Don’t expect it every year,” Klima, who didn’t like the pressure that came with it, said at the time.
It only happened once for the Czech winger.
MEMORIAL RUN
Former Oil Kings defenceman Ashton Sautner, part of the blueline on their 2014 Memorial Cup championship team, played his third pro game against the Oilers. He partnered with Griffin Reinhart on the winning junior team but was never drafted.
He got a look at pro camps with Minnesota and Arizona before signing a three-year deal with the Canucks in 2015. He played in the minors for coach Travis Green, who could be an assistant on Canada’s world junior team for the upcoming tournament in Denmark.
“He’s a kid who really cares and he’s put a lot of work into his trade,” said Green, the first-year Canucks bench boss who coached Sautner in Utica. “He takes things you talk to him about improving and takes them to heart. Every year in Utica, he’s gotten better and he’s able to defend a bit harder, plus he’s a really good skater.”
ANDREJ ALL THE WAY
Oilers coach Todd McLellan said he wasn’t thinking of shutting down d-man Andrej Sekera with five games left, despite his struggle to keep up with the track-meet pace of the game since returning halfway through the season from a knee injury in last year’s playoffs.
“Have we thought of it? Not one bit. He needs to play and play a lot, in a lot of different situations. He knows he has to get his pace up,” said McLellan. “Putting him in the stands for an extended period to watch isn’t going to solve the problem. He needs to go into the summer remembering how fast the game is and how quickly he needs to make decisions.”
TWIN PEAKS
The Sedin twins, Henrik and Daniel, haven’t decided if they’ll play again next season in Vancouver or retire, but McLellan said they’ve still got lots of game left even if the tread on their tires is wearing — they ’ll be 38 in September.
Daniel went into the Oilers game with 51 points and Henrik 47.
“They’re still playing at a high level and as you age your speed and pace diminishes but they don’t have Alzheimer’s,” said McLellan.
“They ’re very smart, very bright and they know where to be and how to play together. That part of the game hasn’t diminished at all.”