Denver- bound Brink, 17, might have Avs’ interest
Let’s just say he’s on the brink of becoming an NHL first- round draft pick.
University of Denver recruit Bobby Brink is expected to join the Pioneers as an accelerated freshman this fall, graduating from high school in just three years. But first, the sensational 17year- old winger from Minnetonka, Minn., and the Sioux City Musketeers of the United States Hockey League probably will become the fifth first- round draft pick in DU’s history.
Brink is ranked 19th among North American skaters by Central Scouting and expects to hear his name called between the 15th and 25th picks of the June 21 draft in Vancouver, British Columbia. The Avalanche has the fourth and 16th picks of the first round and could be in a position to nab the reigning USHL forward of the year with the latter.
“I interviewed with them,” Brink told The Denver Post of his visit with the Avs at the recent NHL combine in Buffalo, N. Y. “It went well. I felt comfortable. It was an easy interview. I don’t know a specific team that is most interested, but it’s probably the teams around 15- 25.”
Brink, 5- foot- 8 and 165 pounds, is coming off a massive rookie season in North America’s only Tier 1 junior- A league. Despite missing 19 games with a broken ankle, he led Sioux City and was ranked fourth among USHL scorers with 68 points in 43 games. He was second in league goal scoring with 35, a Sioux City record.
Brink, who turns 18 on July 8, is the son of former University of Minnesota center Andy Brink, who played four years for the Golden Gophers in the 1990s and represented the United States at the 1994 World Junior Championship. Bobby Brink probably will play for the U. S. at the 2020 WJC, which begins in December.
Andy Brink said he is thrilled to see his son choose DU over Minnesota and the other elite NCAA programs.
“He’s going out in the world and doing his own thing. He’s not following me or doing what he thinks people should do,” the elder Brink said. “He kind of did that already this last year, when he went to Sioux City as a junior in high school. In Minnesota, a junior in high school doesn’t leave to go play juniors. So I like that he is his own man. He kind of bounces things off me, but he makes his own decisions. This was one where, when he said he wanted to go to Denver, I was fully in support of that. It’s an unbelievable school.”
Bobby Brink embraces the challenge. He helped his Minnesota high school team win a state championship as a sophomore but then wanted to go against the grain and join the USHL. Now he wants to accelerate his studies and skip what would have been his senior year of high school to begin his college career.
“I like the way they produce NHL players, how they’re good every year and how they have great coaches and a great culture,” Bobby said of the Pioneers. “I thought it was the best spot for me to go and develop.”
DU’s most recent firstround NHL draft pick was center Henrik Borgstrom, who went 23rd to the Florida Panthers in 2016. The first three were forwards Beau Bennett ( 20th to Pittsburgh in 2010) and Joe Colborne ( 16th to Boston in 2008) and defenseman Craig Redmond ( No. 6 to Los Angeles in 1984).