Meyer gets selected by home team
CHICAGO — Carson Meyer swore he wasn’t going to obsess over getting picked in this year’s NHL draft. After not hearing his name in the last two drafts, he didn’t want to build it up just to be let down.
But, yet again, there he was sitting on pins and needles in his Powell home as the fourth round played out on television from the United Center.
Then the fifth round. Then most of the sixth round.
“When I heard my name on TV,” Meyer said. “I was just stunned.”
The rest of what he heard made it even sweeter.
The Blue Jackets made their hometown fan a hometown prospect, taking Meyer, a skilled forward, in the sixth round (No. 179) on Saturday.
“My sister started shooting a video with her phone right after the pick,” Meyer said. “Everybody in the room was just jumping up and down and going crazy, and I was sitting on the sofa, just stunned. I’ve always had certain goals to achieve. This is a big one. An absolutely huge one.”
Meyer is the second Columbus kid to be drafted by the hometown Blue Jackets. Ten years ago, Dublin’s Trent Vogelhuber was drafted by the Jackets with the last pick of the draft — seventh round, No. 211.
“It’s probably the most fulfilling thing that has ever happened to us with Carson,” said his mom, Holly Meyer. “He has worked so hard for so many years and is finally getting the recognition. And for it to be the Blue Jackets? Unreal. It’s just so incredible and so unreal.”
The Blue Jackets made it clear that a feel-good story had no part in picking Meyer.
Two years ago, he opened eyes around the scouting community by scoring 32 goals in the United States Hockey League. Last season, as a freshman at Miami University, he had 10 goals and 26 points in 32 games.
“It’s a fantastic story, the local team drafting the local kid,” said Chris Morehouse, the Blue Jackets assistant director of amateur scouting. “But he had really good production in the USHL. His production in Miami was great for a first-year kid. That he’s from Columbus is sugar on top of it, but we’re really excited about his future.”
Meyer came to development camp with the Blue Jackets last summer, and he likely would have done the same this year as well. (He had at least eight offers from NHL clubs to attend their summer camps.)
But the Jackets didn’t want to let him get away, especially after seeing how he handled the dejection of not getting drafted the last two years.
KALE HOWARTH
Rd.: 5, No. 148
Position: LW Height/weight: 6-5, 208 Info: A big, lanky forward who was draft eligible — though not drafted — the previous two years. … Committed to the University of Connecticut, which is why he spent
“Full credit to him,” Morehouse said. “He didn’t pout, he didn’t quit. He went right back to work.”
Meyer will return to Miami in the fall. He’ll need to work on his skating if he’s going to continue to ascend the hockey ranks, but now he has a path before him.
And it could lead to the Blue Jackets one day.
“It’s just a huge confidence boost for me,” Meyer said. “I’ve always had certain goals I wanted to achieve, and this is a big one to check off the list on my way. The confidence that Columbus has shown in me, believing in me enough to draft me. It’s going to be a huge boost.”