Laine making a case to be on Leafs’ shopping list
Patrik Laine doesn’t talk much about Toronto.
Ask him about the potential of playing in the National Hockey League next season and the drafteligible prospect starts talking about the team picking second overall. Laine has never been to Winnipeg, but he knows it’s really cold (“I’m used to it living in Finland”) and that the Jets have a bright future (“They didn’t make it to the playoffs this year, but they’re a really good team”) and that Teemu Selanne, of course, holds a special place for the franchise (“A legend”).
And Toronto? Well, Laine might still be holding out hope that the Maple Leafs will make him the No. 1 pick. But he knows he’s probably not going there. Not unless he’s willing to change positions or the Leafs do something unexpected at the draft.
Based on how Laine has been playing at the World Hockey Championship, don’t be surprised if the latter happens.
While it still makes a lot of sense for the Leafs to fill an obvious need at centre and select Auston Matthews, who entered the season as the consensus No. 1 prospect, a Taylor versus Tyler type of debate is starting to form as we inch closer to the June 24 NHL Entry Draft.
If anything, this is no longer the easy decision it once appeared to be.
“We’re going to take the best player,” said Leafs GM Lou Lamoriello, who along with head scout Mark Hunter is at the world championship. “I think it’s great for the fans to put the players in slots, but we have to do what’s right. They’re both exceptional players.”
And both players are performing exceptionally at a tournament that is usually reserved for NHLers, not draft-eligible teenagers.
The 6-foot-3 and 200-pound Laine scored two goals and one assist in his world championship debut against Belarus on Friday night. Two days later, he followed it up with another two-goal-andone-assist performance in a 5-1 win against Germany on Sunday. He leads the tournament with four goals and six points — a remarkable feat considering he celebrated his 18th birthday three weeks ago.
Columbus Blue Jackets GM Jarmo Kekalainen, who has the No. 3 pick in the draft, said Laine’s ability to dominate against men who are older and more experienced “is something that I don’t ever remember seeing.” Added Finnish goalie Mikko Koskinen: “It’s unbelievable to see how good he is at that age. There are no words.”
Matthews, who is also 18 years old, has been just as impressive. Though he went without a point against Canada, he matched Laine’s output (two goals and one assist) against Belarus on Saturday.
The top-two prospects, whose teams did not play against each other at the world juniors in January, meet in a highly anticipated game on Monday.
“I don’t think we’re both focusing on each other,” said Matthews. “I’m sure we both know when each other’s out there and stuff like that, but I think both of us just want to play well and help our team win. We both want a gold medal.”
The natural inclination is to use Monday’s game — and the tournament as a whole — as a head-tohead comparison heading into the draft. But it’s not really fair.
Laine is playing on a deep Finnish team, with Aleksander Barkov and Jussi Jokinen as linemates. Matthews, meanwhile has been centring a line with Jordan Schroeder and Patrick Maroon on a younger and less experienced U.S. team.
More importantly, we are talking about a two-week tournament.
“It’s a whole season or seasons, not just a tournament,” said Lamoriello. “You see as much as you possibly can, find out as much information as you possibly can, but it’s all encompassing. You never put it on one game in this type of situation.
“This is just an opportunity to see them for the last time.”
It’s another way of saying that no NHL general manager is basing the draft order on the world championship. But it’s not entirely meaningless either.
This tournament is another measuring stick. Laine, who tied Matthews with a tournamentleading seven goals in seven games at the world juniors and then was named playoff MVP after winning a Finnish league championship, continues to show that he is every bit as dangerous a sniper as his idol, Alex Ovechkin, was at this age.
At the very least, the gap between he and Matthews continues to shrink. If it were a team other than Toronto picking first, which did not have the same void at centre, maybe Laine would have overtaken Matthews by now. Maybe that is already happening.
“I don’t think anybody has their mind made up yet,” said Kekalainen. “I can’t speak for the other teams but I know that we have a lot of homework to do.”
In other words, forget Winnipeg. Maybe Laine should start talking about Toronto.