5 things to know about No. 1 pick Kirby Dach
With the possibility that Kirby Dach will make the Blackhawks’ opening-day roster, there isn’t much time to get to know the No. 3 pick in the NHL draft. So let’s get right to it.
Here are five things you need to know about Dach:
All in the family: The Dach family had a group of about 45 to 50 family at Rogers Arena to support Kirby, and there’s a good chance they’ll have to do it all over again in two years.
Da c h ’s 16 -ye a r- o l d brother, Colton, is a 6foot-2, 174-pound center who recently was taken sixth overall in the WHL draft by the same Saskatoon Blades team that Kirby played for the last two seasons. If Kirby, who was taken second overall in the 2016 WHL draft, doesn’t make the Hawks this fall, he’ll likely return to Saskatoon and get a chance to play junior hockey with Colton.
“The two of them push each other pretty hard,” Dale Dach said. “They’re pretty competitive.”
For Hawks fans who still aren’t over them passing up defenseman Bowen Byram, this isn’t the first time Dach edged out Byram in a draft. In 2016, when Kirby was drafted second overall by Saskatoon, Byram was taken one pick later.
After the Hawks drafted Dach on Friday, the Avalanche took Byram with the next pick.
Number game: Dach has worn No. 77 with Saskatoon and is @kdach77 on Twitter, so he’ll presumably want that number when he joins the Hawks. He’ll be in good company.
The only player in Hawks history to wear No. 77 is Hall of Fame defenseman Paul Coffey, who played 10 games with the Hawks toward the end of his career.
Playoff payoff: Dach has a bit of a reputation for being inconsistent, but he still averaged over a point a game for Saskatoon. But what really impressed the Hawks was Dach’s ability to elevate his play during the rugged WHL playoffs.
“He was great at stripping pucks, he was great at backchecking, he was great at the physical play when the series got pretty intense in the playoffs and it was clear they were targeting him,” Hawks general manager Stan Bowman said.
“He not only took it, he gave it back. It was impressive to see him raise his game at a time of year when it matters most, which is playoff hockey. You watch the NHL playoffs and you see how intense it can be and then you look at the way he plays and you can see that that game translates.”
Helmets, spatulas and salutes, oh, my! Dale Dach, Kirby’s father, described his son as being a “little quirky” as a kid and it’s easy to see why.
Dach would sometimes go to bed wearing his helmet. Anything that wound up in his hands would be used to play hockey, including kitchen spatulas. But the biggest hockey-related quirk when he was about 5 or 6 years old was also the most endearing.
“As soon as the national anthem came on for either team he would stand up to attention and would salute,” Dale Dach said. “And he would stay there until the anthems are done and then he would sit down and watch the game.”
It wasn’t all quirkiness, though. Dach showed uncommon skill from the time he first put on skates.
“Right from the initiation — that’s we call the first couple years of hockey here in Canada — he excelled,” Dale Dach said. “The way he’s seen the game was noticeable from the start. From there we always put him in as underage to play up a level. So from 5 or 6 years old he always played up one level, and whenever he did go up, he was always one of the top point leaders and was always very successful.”
Winging it: The Hawks drafted Dach as a center and expect him to stick with that position once he reaches the NHL. But a stint in which Dach played wing reinforced their opinion he was the right player for them.
Dach was a member of Team Canada when it competed last year in the Hlinka Gretzky Cup, an international tournament featuring the world’s top under-18 players. The team had plenty of centers, so he was asked to switch to wing, a move he embraced for the good of the team.
“I played wing at Gretzky Cup, but that’s it,” Dach said. “The coaches kind of came to me and asked me if I was OK with playing wing and I said yeah. It’s kind of what I need to do when you’re playing for Team Canada, we were trying to win a gold medal.”
That impressed Bowman tremendously.
“It’s nice to know that he moved to the wing and was very effective in that tournament (and was) one of the top players,” Bowman said. “He even talked about that, how he knew his game was a little different. He sort of approached it like he wanted to be a big power forward that tournament. So I think he can mold his game to the role that he’s given. Not every player is able to do that, but I think first and foremost you look at him as a center.”