We're a week away from the beginning of the KHL regular season, which kicks off on Sept. 2.
That's not quite as important to Canucks fans this season as it has been for the past two years, when all eyes were on the development of Vasily Podkolzin.
But with Vancouver's first-round pick from 2019 headed to North America this fall, we can turn our attention to Dmitry Zlodeyev, the sixth-rounder from 2020 who's hoping to break through to Dynamo Moscow full time this season. With a February birthday, Zlodeyev is also still young enough that he could get a crack at making Russia's World Juniors team this winter.
As for Artyom Manukyan, the pint-sized winger who was selected in the sixth round in 2018 is somehow 23 already. And after spending most of his career with the Omsk organization, last season he switched over to Metallurg. He played in the second-tier VHL and recorded just four points in 17 games.
After playing 112 total games in the KHL in past seasons, I wonder if his time in Russia's top league is over?
As far as Podkolzin's old team goes, SKA St. Petersburg has a new hotshot on its roster — 16-year-old sniper Matvei Michkov, who tore up the World U18 Tournament in Texas earlier this spring.
Michkov made his preseason debut with the KHL club this week, and scored in his first game.
If he keeps this up, he's going to give local boy Connor Bedard a run for his money for the first-overall spot in the 2023 Draft!
As previously discussed, we're expecting Vancouver's second-round pick from 2021, Danila Klimovich, to be in the mix at Canucks training camp next month — and from what I'm hearing, the club will be conducting some kind of sessions for its young players before main camp opens, although it's still unclear exactly what that will look like given all the restrictions that are still in play.
Czech winger Karel Plasek, the sixth-rounder from 2019 who was signed to his entry-level deal in June, will also be headed to North America for the first time, and could land with the Abbotsford Canucks.
After we heard from Henrik Sedin last week over at
The Athletic, Patrick Johnston from
The Province has now caught up with Daniel.
Sounding energized by the opportunity to get back to the rink and see hockey from a different perspective, Daniel makes it clear — unsurprisingly — that he and his brother are committed to their new roles.
"We were like, 'We’re not gonna be there half the time and just show up,'" he said. "We’re there to learn. To learn you have to be there. You have to be there all the time. We couldn’t be more happy with how, like I said, how they included us in everything and have really given us an opportunity to learn. It’s something we’re grateful for."
Daniel says that he and Henrik are keen to get out to Abbotsford and start doing live player evaluations.
"We’ve always just been players; we never really looked at other players, like to evaluate them," he said. "I think that’s something we liked (in the last month), evaluating players and all that. I think it’ll be a fun thing when the season gets going, to go to Abbotsford and then watch those games and watch practice."
And yes, that means they'll be there a lot.
"I also think the only way we can talk to them is if they’re watching every practice, every day," he said. "As a player, I would have time for anyone that I knew that had been there and watched every game and practice. You want the communication, you want the honesty, and I think that’s something we want to do."
The NHL Canucks will kick off their regular season with a six-game road trip that starts Oct. 13 and will play their first regular-season home game of the year on Oct. 26, against the Minnesota Wild.
Click here to access the Abby Canucks' 68-game regular-season schedule. They'll also start on the road, with a three-game trip to California that begins on Oct. 16. Their home opener will take place at the Abbotsford Centre on Friday, Oct. 22, as they kick off a four-game homestand against Vegas's farm team, the Henderson Silver Knights.
That first homestand also features a pair of games against the Los Angeles Kings' AHL affiliate, the Ontario Reign. The Kings, of course, are deep in young talent. And in a league where a good deal of the offensive production often comes from more established players, the top five scorers on the Reign last season were all 20 or under: Arthur Kaliyev (33rd overall in 2019), Akil Thomas (51st overall in 2018), Rasmus Kupari (20th overall in 2018), Alex Turcotte (fifth overall in 2019) and Quinton Byfield (second overall in 2020).
Maybe a couple of those players will move up to the big club this year, but there are only so many roster spots to go around — and those five are just the tip of the iceberg in the Kings' prospect pool.
I'm looking forward to the opportunity to see more of clubs like the Reign this season, and to watch in-division rivalries build among young players at the AHL level that will have the potential to carry forward to the big club as time goes by.
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