Memorial Cup champ Jonathan Huberdeau and the NHL Draft
In late January, The Good Point discussed how the Saint John Sea Dogs and their 17-year-old stud, Jonathan Huberdeau, were in for a banner 2010-11 campaign in a pair of ways.
The first accomplishment — winning the Memorial Cup — was realized quite handily, as they went 3-1 in the major junior showdown. The other — Huberdeau going in the top five at the 2011 NHL Entry Draft — has yet to come to fruition, but mainly since it’s out of their hands.
At the end of June, Huberdeau, and teammates Nathan Beaulieu, Tomas Jurco and Zack Phillips will fly to Minnesota, hoping to return to their respective hometowns with first-round selections to brag about.
It would come to no surprise as each player is hot off impressive offensive outputs, a national championship and the NHL Draft Combine.
Huberdeau in particular, the first Sea Dog in the club’s young history to break the 100-point barrier (43 goals, 62 assists), topped off his attention-catching regular season with an incredible playoff run that was concluded by Memorial Cup Tournament MVP honours.
“When he had his chance to make plays, he made great plays,” said Saint John head coach Gerard Gallant, about the St. Jerome, Quebec native’s Memorial Cup performance.
Gallant, a major junior star in his own right, has had great trust in the two-way threat. According to Hockey Prospect‘s 2011 NHL Draft Guide, Huberdeau has been a mainstay on the Sea Dogs’ first penalty killing unit since breaking into the Quebec league.
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But that’s not the chief reason why he has been mentioned in the same breath as season-long top three draft eligible forwards Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, Sean Couturier and Gabriel Landeskog.
Huberdeau’s 70-point improvement on his 2009-10 numbers — the largest increase among the top five — assuredly showed that the kid can mark up the score sheet with the best of them.
“He’s going to be an outstanding player,” Gallant said. “He had a fabulous season for us and, as a 17-year-old kid, was the offensive leader of our hockey club.”
Barring unforeseen circumstances, Huberdeau, a die-hard Canadiens fan who grew up idolizing fellow Montrealer Vincent Lecavalier, will be picked much higher than the Habs’ 17th and Lightning’s 27th spots. Although he’s been pinned as a top three by many, the general feel among the hockey community is that Huberdeau will go fifth overall to the ever-struggling Islanders.
The Kontinental Hockey League, which doesn’t moonlight as an NHL projector but could, says fifth overall is exactly where he’ll be headed – oddly enough to KHL club Vityaz Chekhov. Huberdeau was the only Canadian whose rights were claimed in the 24-pick first-round of the May 28 draft.
When asked by the media about the fifth-overall selection, Huberdeau joked around a little bit due to his unfamiliarity with the overseas pro league.
“Yeah, wrong letter — missed the ‘N’ at the beginning,” he said, adding that he had yet to speak to anyone from the KHL.
The few skeptics of the 6’1″, 170-pounder have been directing attention to Huberdeau’s currently undersized frame. Like dozens of other prospects though, the 1993-born juggernaut plans to pack on the pounds during the summer months.
“I’m not a big guy,” admitted Huberdeau. “I want to put on 10-15 pounds in the summer to get me ready for the NHL camp.”
At the NHL Draft Combine, those same skeptics had backing to their views as Huberdeau completed a measly two reps on the bench press, while his peers lifted the same weight eight to 10 times more.
Bob McKenzie, TSN‘s Hockey Insider, blogged about the strain Huberdeau’s body has been under over the past year and came to the conclusion that his poor showing at the Combine won’t turn clubs off.
Taylor Hall, who went first in the 2010 NHL Entry Draft, won back-to-back Memorial Cups with the Windsor Spitfires before hearing his named called at the draft. He chose to decline the Combine invite altogether – something that obviously didn’t hurt his chances.
Interestingly enough, following the Memorial Cup victory, Huberdeau mentioned Hall when asked about potentially going high in the draft just after winning the major junior championship.
“Taylor Hall did it last year, and now this year I’m doing it.”
Jonathan Huberdeau, suit up. It’s draft time.
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Check out more of The Good Point’s 2011 NHL Entry Draft Prospects Series.
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