Leonard may be the safest choice
Maybe the safest pick pegged for the top 10: Ryan Leonard.
The Amherst product is a rock-solid 6 feet, 195 pounds. Billed as a strong, gritty winger with skill, he could ride the momentum of Matthew Tkachuk up the draft board.
Leonard loves to throw the body. He creates space with crushing hits and smart work along the boards. He skates through opponents and often adds a little extra. His game has “functional violence,” as one scout described it.
He can dangle and finish. He attacks at creative angles and is deceptive with the puck on his stick. His passing is billed as some of the best in the draft, though he isn’t always precise with his feeds and can be turnover-prone. He can get quicker laterally. But after a couple of years at Boston College — with US National Team Development Program linemates Will Smith and Gabe Perreault — Leonard should be ready for the show.
“It hasn’t hit me yet,” Leonard said after a long three-on-three session this past Thursday at Olympia Rink in Boxborough with fellow Western Mass. product Frank Vatrano. “I’m sure once I get on the plane, I’ll have the nerves.”
Before older brother John Leonard (ex-of the Sharks and Predators) took to the ice, basketball was the family trade. Their father, John Sr., was a 6-1 guard drafted by the Knicks (10th round, 1982) and played in the Continental Basketball Association. He spent three decades as a college coach, including 1992-96 as an associate coach at powerhouse Villanova and 2001-05 as an assistant at UMass.
He also was the head coach (199699) at his alma mater, Manhattan, which made him a school Hall of Famer in 2009. Daughters Alyssa (Castleton) and Brianna (Eastern Conn.) played in college.
“He says he knows hockey, but he doesn’t,” Ryan Leonard said of his father. “It’s a completely different game. But he tells me good job and all that. He’s very supportive.”
The boys caught the hockey bug when their mother, Cynthia, signed them up for a learn-to-skate program at the Mullins Center.
Ryan went from Pope Francis High in Springfield (Super 8 co-champ in 2020, USA Hockey national champ in 2021) to the US Under-18 program. In April, he scored the golden goal in overtime against Sweden to win the U-18 Worlds in Basel, Switzerland. He carried into the zone, cut into space against two defenders, and whipped a wrister past netminder Noah Erliden.
Leonard finished third in tournament scoring (8-9–17) for the US, which outscored opponents, 51-10, in seven straight wins. Leonard went 5143–94 in 57 games for the US U-18s, playing some pretty give-and-go hockey with Smith and Perreault.
Free advice to BC coach Greg Brown: Keep ‘em together.
Conroy has his work cut out
Craig Conroy, take a deep breath. The new Flames GM has monumental decisions to make in his first few months on the job, not the least of which is wondering why his predecessor gave Nazem Kadri, who will be 33 on opening night, seven years and $49 million last summer.
First-line center Elias Lindholm, who watched linemates Johnny Gaudreau and Tkachuk depart last summer, saw his production take a corresponding nosedive: 42 goals, 82 points, and a Selke Trophy runner-up finish in 202122, and 22 goals, 64 points, and a playoff DNQ this past season. Though Conroy is prepared to sign him to a deal in the Bo Horvat range (eight years, $68 million), Lindholm reportedly hasn’t confirmed that he’s hungry for what the Flames have cooking.
Meanwhile, Norwood-bred Noah Hanifin does not intend to sign an extension. The 26-year-old, sturdy, mobile top-four defenseman has one year left at $4.95 million, and an eight-team notrade list. The Bruins nearly traded up (with Arizona) to draft him third overall in 2015. Don Sweeney has long had interest in the player, but the Bruins would need to clear bodies and cap space to bring him in.
Also, according to Daily Faceoff ’s Frank Seravalli, 15-year Flame Mikael Backlund is leaning toward an exit. His $5.35 million tag expires next summer.
Still a steady two-way hand at age 34, he has a 10-team trade list.
And if that wasn’t enough, Tyler Toffoli (expiring $4.25 million) wants out, per Seravalli.
With Dustin Wolf on the way from the AHL, the Flames are likely to move ex-Bruin Dan Vladar, the well-liked backup goalie.
Twenty years later, a draft re-do
This marks 20 years since the heralded 2003 draft, which saw Marc-Andre Fleury, Eric Staal, and Nathan Horton go 1-2-3, and gems such as Patrice Bergeron (45th), Shea Weber (49th), and Joe Pavelski (205th) go much later.
In a redraft, you would find an entire first round of quality NHL players. Here’s one writer’s reimagined top 10: 1. Bergeron, Pittsburgh; 2. Ryan Getzlaf, (19th in ‘03), Carolina; 3. Weber, Florida; 4. Staal, Columbus; 5. Fleury, Buffalo; 6. Pavelski, San Jose; 7. Corey Perry (28th), Nashville; 8. Brent Burns (20th), Atlanta; 9. Dustin Brown (13th), Calgary; 10. Ryan Suter (seventh), Montreal.
While the mind reels at Bergeron spending a Hall of Fame career with the Penguins (surely he would have pulled Mario Lemieux out of retirement, a la rookie-year Sidney Crosby), it’s also funny to think that some of the players the Bruins wound up acquiring later — Horton, David Backes, Jaroslav Halák, Loui Eriksson — might have been available at No. 21 in a re-drafted 2003.
They picked Mark Stuart … and fared better in the second round.
Local flavor in Calder Cup Final
The Calder Cup Final had a north of Boston finish.
Mike Vecchione, of Saugus, scored in overtime to give Hershey the AHL championship on Wednesday. On a scramble in front, he popped one past netminder Joey Daccord, of North Andover.
Vecchione, 30, was a two-time Globe All-Scholastic and led Malden Catholic to its first Super 8 title in 2011. He won an NCAA championship at Union in 2014, and was ECAC Player of the Year and a Hobey Baker finalist in 2017.
He signed with the Flyers that spring and appeared in two NHL games. His only NHL game since came with Washington in 2021-22.
He attended Bruins development camp in 2015, the same year they brought fellow undrafted hopefuls Brandon Tanev and Alex Iafallo to compete at Ristuccia Arena.
Tough finish for Daccord, 26, who set an AHL record by opening the Calder Cup Final with back-to-back shutouts. He lost three of the next five in overtime, including 1-0 in Game 5 at Hershey. He stopped 35 of 38 in Game 7.
Daccord, who has played in 10 games for the Kraken the last two seasons, was drafted by Ottawa in 2015 out of Cushing Academy, before heading to Arizona State (and becoming a Hobey Baker finalist in 2019). He turned pro with the Senators that year and appeared in nine games over two seasons before Seattle claimed him in the 2021 expansion draft.
Both players’ deals are expiring. Vecchione is coming off his fourth consecutive one-year deal. Daccord was on a three-year pact.
Loose pucks
Rumor in Winnipeg is that former captain Blake Wheeler will be bought out. That would knock down the Jets’ cap hit from $8.25 million this year to $2.75 million in each of the next two years (with the cap slated to rise by some $4 million in 2024-25) . . . Milan Lucic has played out his seven-year, $42 million contract. Now 35 and coming off a gold medal with Canada at the World Championships, Lucic is looking for work. Still big and mean, Lucic will have plenty of suitors if he plays for something cheap (think: one year, $1 million). The Flames have given permission to agent Gerry Johansson to talk to teams ahead of July 1. A Bruins reunion would be fun, but the Loochomotive doesn’t arrive as quickly as it used to . . . Speaking of ex-Flames, Conroy hired Marc Savard as an assistant for new coach Ryan Huska . . . Braintree product Adam Gaudette signed a oneyear, two-way extension with the Blues at the league minimum ($775,000). Gaudette came to St. Louis in the Ryan O’Reilly-Noel Acciari trade with Toronto and put up 27-24–51 in 65 AHL games this past season . . . The Bruins will host a series of camps in Brighton, Haverhill, Marlborough, and Nashua, N.H. from Monday through Aug. 10. Schedule and registration at bostonbruins.com/summercamp.