Hockey's Future - The #1 Online Prospects Resource

As the primary partner for the Oilers, Wilkes-Barre has housed the more high-end prospects the Oilers have sent to the AHL this year. A few players have gone back and forth between the Baby Penguins and the Oilers, and those that have speak highly of the situation in Pennsylvania.

Kyle Brodziak C, (7^th round, 2003)

Now in the third and final year of his entry-level contract, Alberta-born Kyle Brodziak is on pace to shatter his previous career highs in scoring. Brodziak put up 32 points in his rookie year with the Edmonton Road Runners and followed that up with 31 with the Iowa Stars. Already in 2006-07 the center has accounted for 28 points (10 goals, 18 assists) in just 33 games.

"I’ve been very impressed with Kyle," began Kevin Prendergast, Vice President of Hockey Operations for the Oilers. "He’s really improved his skating, and the one thing Kyle does very well is, he has great hockey sense and when we talk about accountability or reliability he certainly gives us that."

Coach Todd Richards is not afraid to use Brodziak in all aspects of the game whether it be on the power play, penalty kill or in the last few minutes of a game either looking to protect a lead or strike for a late equalizer.

The Oilers have told Brodziak that he is definitely on their radar for a call up but that he needs to continue to play well and be patient while he awaits his chance.

"He’s just going in the right direction and doing all the little things right so he’s very close and Kyle might get that call up in the next little while."

Rob Schremp C, (1^st round, 2004)

After his 145-point finale in the OHL a season ago, big things were expected from Rob Schremp this year. His rookie campaign as a pro has not been without hardship and, although he is producing, it is a far cry from what he was able to accomplish at the Major Junior level. After 32 games Schremp has collected 25 points (7 goals, 18 assists), just good enough for a share of 10^th place in league rookie scoring.

The graduation to the AHL has clearly affected Schremp’s ability to score but the gifted passer has had success being a set-up man and is in control of the power play

"The thing that Robbie has to learn is that the whole game of hockey isn’t based on the power play and on offence and so he’s working on his defensive game, working on face-offs," Prendergast told Hockey’s Future recently. "London was such a good team that the bad habits didn’t matter because they were going to outscore everybody they played."

"He’s getting it bit by bit and I know it’s a bit of a project for the fans who are in a hurry to see him up here but we’re not going to bring him up until we know he’s ready to come up."

It’s not the point total that is disappointing but rather the lack of scoring. Characterized by the Oilers organization as a one shot sniper, Schremp has found the back of the net just 7 times through 32 games. From an Oiler position, is that enough?

"I don’t think so and from talking with him I don’t think it’s enough in his mind either," said Prendergast. "He’s struggling with the stick scenario down there, he’s trying to get back to his old sticks and we’re trying to help him out from that standpoint, but every time we’ve seen him play he could have had three or four goals every game."

The AHL restricts teams to use only league sponsored brands of sticks, in this case Reebok, and so some players have experienced difficulty adjusting to foreign tools. In Schremp’s case, a player who makes his living directly with the stick in his hands, that adjustment has been problematic.

Schremp is on pace for a 66-point season, well below the performances of other high end AHL rookies in previous years like Patrick O’Sullivan (LA) who had 93 points a year ago.

"At this point we’re not measuring Robbie on points, we’re measuring him on how well he’s learning the defensive style of game; reliability is one of the main things we’re looking for from him."

Marc-Antoine Pouliot C, (1^st round, 2003)

He was the last forward cut from camp and after some political red tape was cleared up, Marc-Antoine Pouliot joined Wilkes-Barre after missing opening night. Pouliot took a handful of games to shake off the bitterness he felt from being cut. But after speaking with the Oilers and getting reassurance of his future with the team, the Quebec City product turned it up a notch and earned his way back to the NHL.

Pouliot played 18 games on the farm and came away with a point per game record with eight goals and ten helpers. By the end of his stint in Wilkes-Barre he was considered the best player on the club and was clearly in need of the NHL challenge.

Tom Gilbert D, (4^th round, 2002, Colorado)

After a very promising senior year with the National Champion Wisconsin Badgers, Tom Gilbert has continued his stellar play as a professional rookie in the AHL. Gilbert leads all Wilkes-Barre defencemen in scoring with 19 points (3 goals, 16 assists) and a respectable plus-6 rating. His solid play has many Oilers followers wondering if Gilbert can repeat fellow collegian Matt Greene’s success after Greene stuck with the Oilers following a mid-season call up a year ago.

"Every time [a scout] has gone in to see him his game has gotten a little better, and when I went to see him recently compared to the fall, I couldn’t believe the difference just in his poise and his handling and passing of the puck," beamed Prendergast.

Gilbert is currently 8^th in AHL defensive scoring, just a single point behind the leading defensive rookie scorer.

"There are a couple of things he’s still got to work on a bit, like his man coverage in his own end," the head scout critiqued. "He seems to get lost with his man from time to time but he’s improving on that. He’s close to being a NHL player but we want to make sure that, as we did with Matt Greene, all the points are covered and every part of his game is at a pretty good point so that when we do call him up, he might not go back down."

According to the Oilers, Gilbert is on the top power play and penalty-killing units, providing him with an exceptional amount of ice time. As a result, the NHL club isn’t in a rush to pull him out of that sort of beneficial scenario unless he’s ready to assume a top 6 role in Edmonton.

"I assume that over the course of this year that he’s a player that will be coming back up here."

Alexei Mikhnov LW, (1^st round, 2000)

New to North America, to the NHL, to Edmonton and to his Oiler teammates, Ukrainian forward Alexei Mikhnov has often looked like a person who doesn’t quite seem to fit in. His training camp was uninspiring outside of the occasional flashes of offense but it wasn’t enough to land him a steady job in the NHL.

Sent to the farm for conditioning, Mikhnov regained his confidence and scoring touch while producing 10 points in 13 games. The Ukrainian was promptly recalled by the Oilers, sat for a few games then finally was inserted into their lineup for a single game before being reassigned to Wilkes-Barre/Scranton. In the four games since landing back with the baby Penguins Mikhnov has scored once but is a minus player.

There is at least some concern in the organization that the multiple demotions coupled with a lack of playing time when in Edmonton could lead to discontent that would see Mikhnov return to Russia in much the same way as Enver Lisin (PHX) did earlier this year.

Jeff Drouin-Deslauriers G, (2^nd Round, 2003)

2006-07 is a huge year for a few Oiler prospects, but none more so than for netminder Jeff Drouin-Deslauriers. The former QMJHL star has a lot to prove to the organization, his critics and to himself after a very forgettable 2005-06 season. Last year was a disappointment for Drouin-Deslauriers after having played in just 13 pro games. The lack of playing time was due to many factors, including a serious knee injury and a horrible situation in Hamilton where he was bogged down at the goalie position with several other keepers.

Drouin-Deslauriers has wasted no time in righting his ship and retaking the tag of "goalie of the future" for the Oilers. His 11 wins (8^th AHL), 2.31 goals-against average (4^th AHL) and .912 save percentage (12^th AHL) are all stats that show a goaltender that is playing with renewed confidence after rediscovering his game.

"He’s so, what we like to call "quiet" in the net meaning there’s not a lot of extra movement because he’s just reading the play so well and moving into position to make the save," Prendergast said.

After a recent game in Hamilton against the Bulldogs, coach Don Lever gave high praise to Drouin-Deslauriers, the goalie he just couldn’t seem to find a way to give ice time to when he was on his team last year.

"He told me after the game that [Drouin-Deslauriers’] performance was one of the best he’d seen all year so yeah… he’s back in the picture," Prendergast stated. "From a confidence perspective from the organization and for himself, that’s working both ways right now."

Jean-Francois Jacques LW, (2^nd round, 2003)

Power forward J.F. Jacques was sent to the farm by Edmonton for a brief 5-game stint at the tail end of November to knock off some of the rust that had collected as a result of sitting through most of the first two months of the NHL campaign. In the AHL, Jacques earned six points in those five games and was quickly ticketed back to Alberta.

The year began with three Oilers’ properties on the Grand Rapids roster, but that number has been trimmed back to two after forward Stephane Goulet’s voluntary reassignment to the ECHL. The Griffins are the AHL affiliate of the Detroit Red Wings.

Danny Syvret D, (3^rd round, 2005)

Another player who was hoping to avoid repeating last season’s AHL fiasco is rearguard Dan Syvret. The diminutive defenseman has managed to score his first four pro goals and has added nine more helpers for a total of 13 points this season. Although he is presently representing Canada at the Spengler Cup, Edmonton is very happy with the situation Syvret has been placed into with the Griffins.

"The thing that has impressed me the most this year that I didn’t notice last year is his agility and his ability to pivot and go back and get the puck and move it right away," said Prendergast. "I talked to his coach after a game in Toronto and he said that he’s very, very close to being a NHL player."

"It’s unfortunate that he didn’t get the opportunity to play with the big team when he was up here [Edmonton] but at this point I don’t think there would be any doubt of his ability to contribute."

Prendergast believes that slaying that monkey by finally scoring at the AHL level is a huge bonus for Syvret.

"A lot of players go into the AHL in their first year and they don’t give the league enough respect and they end up behind the 8-ball because it’s a really good league," he said. "Danny went back in a different scenario from Hamilton to Grand Rapids with a lot more confidence in his game because he’d learned a lot last year and then coming up with the team here in the playoffs. He went home in the summer and worked really hard on his skating and his strength as well as his conditioning and he’s taken that to Grand Rapids this year. I think he’s probably one of their top two defencemen."

"He has the confidence now to play at that level, he doesn’t have the "deer in the headlights" look anymore, and he’s being played in every situation there," he added.

Brock Radunske LW, (3^rd round, 2002)

With a year in the ECHL under his belt the Edmonton Oilers feel it is imperative to the New Hamburg, Ontario product’s development that he spend the year in the AHL, even if it means not playing that many games. So far that’s exactly what it’s meant as Radunske has dressed in just 12 games for the Griffins.

"They’ve told me that they’re trying to move a body off their roster to get [Radunske] more ice time," Prendergast said. "He can play at that level but we’re in that scenario where it’s not our team and obviously Detroit has players that they want to see ahead of him."

Prendergast says that unlike Tim Sestito and Stephane Goulet, who both began the year in the AHL, Radunske has chosen to stay in Grand Rapids.

"I left the option up to him if he wanted to go down to play and he said that he wanted to stick it out there for the time being," he explained.

From Radunske’s perspective, he had 38 goals for Greenville last year so he has already proven that he is ready for the bigger challenge presented by the AHL.

Zack Stortini LW, (2^nd round, 2003)

Stortini played for two AHL teams last year and, while with Milwaukee, went all the way to the Calder Cup Finals. This season, Zack Stortini is gaining accolades with the Hamilton Bulldogs as more than just one of the tougher, up-and-coming fighters in hockey.

As expected, Stortini is leading the Bulldogs with 130 penalty minutes but surprisingly the noted pugilist is also finding the back of the net this year having lit the lamp eight times in 35 games.

"It’s coming from confidence," Prendergast explained. "The coach is showing confidence in him. Zack’s role at the beginning of the year was just to be the guy who goes in and mucks it up and he’s done that. But at the same time he started to score goals and Don Lever told me recently that a big part of their turn around this year was because of the way that Zack played. The whole team sort of jumped on his back and played that style."

"He’s really worked on his skating and that was the one thing we really wanted him to work on," he added. "We know exactly what Zack’s going to bring to the rink every night and he’s a bear when it comes to that. He had a great fight with Tyson Nash where it got pretty rough and he tried to elbow him like in the WWF a couple of times and he threw the linesman off of him twice to get at him!"

Teammate and fellow Oiler prospect Mathieu Roy says that Zack is quickly earning a reputation in the AHL as an unpredictable tough guy.

"He’s playing on the power play, getting dirty, being in front and tipping pucks and getting rebounds," Roy said. "Maybe teams are scared of him a little bit because he’s a tough kid and doing his job really well. He’s such a nice guy off the ice but when he gets mad he just gets crazy!"

The Oilers recalled Stortini on the eve of a game against the Calgary Flames. Most assumed he would dress for the tilt but he did not and was returned to Hamilton less than 48 hours later.

Mathieu Roy D, (7^th round, 2003)

Like Stortini and Syvret, Roy has visited Edmonton recently but did not dress for action in the NHL. The Oilers have been very encouraged by Roy’s performance this year in Hamilton and point out that his team high plus-16 rating is significant for indicating that he is defensively sound should the need arise at the NHL level.

"It was more of a little bit of a reward for Mathieu to come up here," Prendergast admitted. "From my standpoint I’d obviously like to see those guys play but [MacTavish] has a job to do and he’s comfortable with the guys he’s playing. They haven’t done anything wrong to warrant coming out so Mathieu was here basically as a band aid if anybody got hurt."

During his brief stint in Edmonton Roy was able to update Hockey’s Future with his progress on the farm this year.

"I’m getting a lot of ice time, power play and penalty kill too so I’m on the ice in all kinds of situations and at the end of the games," Roy began as he described the differences between Hamilton this year and last. "We’ve got a way stronger defensive unit and goaltending has been playing unbelievable for us and the forwards do what they have to do so it’s been going pretty good."

Roy has six goals and ten assists for 16 points, good for 19^th overall in scoring amongst AHL rearguards. Just five defensemen have scored more goals, including veteran Andy Delmore who is tops with 8.

Bryan Young D, (5^th round, 2004)

It almost seems as though Bryan Young has been isolated in Milwaukee as the very quiet rearguard simply goes about his business of playing sound defensive hockey while making no noise offensively. Through 20 games with the Admirals Young has not registered a single point, but that should come as no surprise as even in the OHL Young never surpassed the 12-point plateau. In 126 career games with Peterborough he only found the back of the net once.

"He just went down to Stockton to play the two games," Prendergast began. "Milwaukee had nine defensemen there for a bit and they were good enough to call us and tell us that they weren’t going to play him so that gave us the opportunity to get him a couple of games down in Stockton. We’ll probably still get him a couple more down there."

Should Young get into a total of five regular season games with the Thunder he would then be eligible to play for the ECHL club in the post season should the Admirals’ year end earlier than hoped. That said, look for the Oilers to dispatch Young to Stockton to play at least three more games before the end of March.

"That would be a good scenario for him on a very good hockey team," he added. "Playing is the key for him; he has to play to improve and Bryan has learned a lot from Claude Noel in Milwaukee and it’s not as if he’s an outcast on that club. We feel Bryan is going to play in the NHL, it’s just a matter of when he’s going to come up here."

"Bryan is a deceptive player; he doesn’t look like he’s big, he doesn’t look like he’s tough but boy he is physically very strong and he keeps his game very simple," Prendergast summed up. "He’s an old school defensive defenceman and, with the other offensive minded guys we have, he’s going to make for a good mix in our organization."