Etem lauds ‘awesome’ Desjardins
California kid played for WHL coach who now heads up Canucks
Emerson Etem says that Willie Desjardins’ reputation played a major role in a California kid chasing his hockey dream to the Prairies.
“I knew that he knew talent, from having guys like Tyler Ennis and Joffrey Lupul there,” Etem, the Anaheim Ducks right winger from Long Beach, Calif., said of Desjardins, the current Canucks coach who recruited him to the WHL’s Medicine Hat Tigers for the 2009-10 season.
“I looked at those guys that he had produced, and that he had won the WHL championship and went to the Memorial Cup a few years prior (2007),” said Etem.
“I knew that he was a winner and the word going around was that he was an awesome, awesome hockey guy, and I think that’s what I needed in my life at that point.”
Etem, 22, is one of the rising stars with the Ducks, a 2010 first-round draft pick whose name was thrown about when talk of Ryan Kesler being traded to Anaheim first arose. It feels like the 6-foot-1, 212-pound, lefthanded-shooting speedster is now starting to take a step even further forward. In Anaheim’s 20 games this season prior to their visit to Rogers Arena Thursday, Etem averaged 11 minutes, 24 seconds of ice time.
But in the four games leading into the tilt against the Canucks, he was up to 14:56 a night, and starting to see time with Ryan Getzlaf and Corey Perry on the Ducks’ first unit.
He had two goals and two assists through his first 20 games with Anaheim this season.
He did have caché before Desjardins got to him. His parents, Rick and Pat, were collegiate rowers, and Pat competed for the U.S. at the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics.
Etem grew up 20 minutes from the Ducks’ home rink, the Honda Center. You can find stories of a 14-yearold Etem riding public transit to get to workouts set up by Venice Beach fitness guru T.R. Goodman, where Etem would often go through the paces alongside then-NHLers Rob Blake and Chris Chelios.
Etem starred at Shattuck-St. Mary’s, the boarding school in Faribault, Minn., that has also been home to Sidney Crosby and Jonathan Toews, among others.
Etem had been one of the better players with the U.S. National Development team, based out of Ann Arbor, Mich., the season before he came to Medicine Hat, and could have easily stayed there. Medicine Hat went after him hard. They had picked him in the sixth round of the 2007 bantam draft and it was a coup to get him.
And how did Desjardins handle him as coach? Etem says Desjardins put him to work.
“He didn’t hand anything to me,” Etem maintained. “I came there expecting a lot of ice time and to be put on the power play right away, and the penalty kill, too. I had to learn. I started out pretty much just 5-on-5. That was great. It made me work that much harder.
“We had a great year that year. I learned so much from him, both about the game and off-ice stuff. He made me a better person.”
As a 17-year-old that season, Etem led all league rookies in goals, putting up 37 in 72 games.
Desjardins left for a job with the Dallas Stars that next summer, and assistant Shaun Clouston replaced him at the helm in Medicine Hat. Etem bagged 45 goals in 65 games that season, playing on a line with current Canuck Linden Vey.
Vey won the league scoring championship, with 116 points, including 46 goals.
In his final season in the WHL in 2011-12, Etem led the league with 61 goals, and his 107 points put him seventh in that category.
Canucks prospect Hunter Shinkaruk was his linemate for much of that campaign.
“I know he’s a passionate guy and he’s a little bit disappointed that he didn’t make the Canucks roster,” Etem said of Shinkaruk, a left-winger currently with the AHL’s Utica Comets. “He loves the game. He’s going to be quite a player.
“He has that Crosby-type shuffle step in his stride. Jeff Skinner has it. A lot of top guys are using it and it looks very effective. He’s very slippery in the corners. He’s just a great playmaker and scorer.”