CONSENSUS NO. 1 PICK
Matthews in high demand
The kid is curious about Canada.
After all, there is a really good chance that a Canadian team will win the right to select Auston Matthews during Saturday night’s NHL Draft Lottery. So the Arizona-raised forward, who spent this year playing professional hockey in Switzerland, has lots of questions about what could be his new country.
But it’s not the usual stuff, like whether it snows all year round or do we live in igloos and really use Monopoly money to buy things. No, Matthews wants to know what it’s like to play with the Sedins in Vancouver, how intense the rivalry is between Edmonton and Calgary and whether Maple Leafs general manager Lou Lamoriello is as scary as the media makes him seem.
“I got a lot of questions about Lou, because he’s heard of Lou,” said Marc Crawford, who coached Matthews with the Zurich Lions this past season. “I shared with him the story that I had a chance to work with Lou around 2006 and didn’t do it because I was afraid of it. It was probably the worst mistake I ever made, because once I got to know Lou I realized just how nurturing a guy he is and how positive he is with the organization.
“There’s a 70 per cent chance that he’s going to Canada. He knows that.”
While Matthews might not know a whole lot about Canada, our knowledge of the 6-foot-2 and 194-pound centre is also very limited.
Matthews is considered the consensus No. 1 pick in this year’s draft, but it’s hard to know just how good he is because the 18-year-old spent his draft year playing in anonymity in Europe. Is Matthews as good a No. 1 pick as Connor McDavid was last year? Is he better than last year’s No. 2 pick Jack Eichel?
Is he even the best player available in a front-loaded draft that includes surging Finnish wingers Patrik Laine and Jesse Puljujarvi?
“People don’t know how good he is because he wasn’t around to scrutinize all year,” said a scout for a Canadian team. “I think that’s a huge advantage for him. The team that gets him is going to be incredibly surprised just how good he is.
“I hear things like he would have gone third in last year’s draft. Are you kidding? No disrespect to Eichel, but he couldn’t carry Matthews’ skates to the rink. His impact in the NHL is going to be special.”
This is what we know for sure: Matthews has taken a very nontraditional route to becoming the top NHL prospect. Born in California and raised in Scottsdale, Ariz., he grew up a fan of the Coyotes and spent summers as a teenager skating with the team. As a member of the U.S. National Team Development Program in 2014-15, he broke Patrick Kane’s record for points in a season.
“Anybody who’s been watching the U.S. amateur program for the last two years is very familiar with Auston and his game,” said former Coyotes GM Don Maloney. “He was actually at our development camp (last year) watching and I told him I had a contract in my office: ‘Let’s get this over with.’”
Had he been born two days earlier, Matthews would have been eligible for last year’s draft and would have been a top-three pick. As such, there was no incentive in spending his draft year in major junior like McDavid (the WHL’s Everett Silvertips held his rights) or in college like Eichel (he had been recruited by Boston College and four other schools). And so Matthews made the unique decision to play professionally in the Swiss league, where he reportedly earned a generous six-figure salary and competed against former NHLers.
Matthews excelled in the unfamiliar environment, scoring 24 goals and 46 points in 36 games and was a finalist for league MVP. He also won a bronze at the world junior championship, where he was named to the allstar team and tied Laine with a tournament-leading seven goals in seven games.
“Let’s face it, playing for a guy like (Crawford) is no picnic,” said a scout who watched Matthews in Switzerland. “But he went over there and adjusted to the new culture, played in a new league on a bigger ice surface, and came out of that as the best player. That speaks volumes.”
NHL Central Scouting’s Dan Marr said Matthews is “the clearcut No. 1,” a complete player who has all the physical and offensive tools to be a game-changer at the NHL level. Ron Wilson, who coached Matthews at the world juniors, said he “can dish the puck and make passes like I’ve rarely seen as a coach.”
“There’s a lot you see in his game that equates to a really good hockey player,” said Jim Johansson, USA Hockey’s assistant executive director of hockey operations, who last year invited Matthews to play in an exhibition game at the 2015 world championship hours after he was named MVP at the Under-18 tournament.
“To be brutally honest, we needed a body for the game and he was right there. And he scored a goal and our coaches said, ‘He’s staying right?’
“I was like, ‘no, he’s only 17.’ But the poise and skill he had in that one game was intriguing.”
Matthews is expected to play a significant role for the U.S. at this year’s world championship in Russia. Depending on how he performs, there is talk of him playing for the North American young stars team at the World Cup in September.
After that, it’s off to the NHL, where Crawford is confident he will succeed regardless of what country he is playing in.
“I have no doubt that he’s going to be a top No. 1 centre in the National Hockey League,” said Crawford. “He’s got the same vision, the same presence with the puck, the same take-charge attitude as McDavid and Eichel. I don’t want to put the pressure on him that he’s going to be a franchise player, but he’s going to have no problem fitting into the NHL.
“He’s not afraid of big markets. He just loves to play.”