CANTLON’S CORNER: HOCKEY NEWS AND NOTES OFF SEASON VOLUME 20 

BY: Gerry Cantlon, Howlings

HARTFORD, CT – Pre-season hockey has started and the playoffs begin this weekend in both Toronto and Edmonton.

There have been two possible player moves that have come to light recently and the first concerns the Hartford Wolf Pack’s Vinni Lettieri.

The Pack forward will enter Group 6 free agency at the official conclusion of the 2019-20 hockey season. According to a Swiss-based website, watson.ch, Lettieri is in discussion with SC Bern (Switzerland-LNA), one of the top European teams, and not just in Switzerland.

The team’s new head coach is former Hartford Whaler and New Haven Nighthawk, Don Nachbaur.

Lettieri has completed three seasons in Hartford and rung-up 132 points in 173 AHL games and was the leading goal scorer in each of his three seasons. In 61 games of the pandemic shortened 2019-20 season, he tallied 35 goals in 61 games and a team-leading 47 points.

He was originally signed as a free agent out of the University of Minnesota Golden Gophers on March 27, 2017, and played the final nine games of the regular season in Hartford.

He led the Wolf Pack with 23 goals in 55 games in his first season, and in his sophomore season, he had 23 goals in 48 games.

Lettieri played 46 games with the Rangers with two goals and six assists with constantly fluctuating periods of ice time and had no recalls last season.

Whether his season ends if he is not brought to Toronto as part of the Rangers NHL playoff roster, or if he is and it ends when the Rangers playoff season concludes or should he still be part of the team when Lord Stanley is crowned in Edmonton, a Solomonic decision awaits according to one of our long-time sources.

Almost twenty years ago a similar decision faced former Wolf Pack great, Derek Armstrong. He left in 2001-02 and spent a year with SC Bern but under different circumstances. Armstrong returned to North America and had a long run with the LA Kinga before ending his NHL career with St. Louis.

On the other side of the coin, there is another possible European signing with important hockey implications.

It looks like the first major player to leave ECACHL Division-I college hockey due to the pandemic has a Connecticut connection.

Jack Drury, a junior forward for Harvard University (ECACHL), and a 2018 second-round selection, (42nd overall) by the Carolina Hurricanes, is the son of ex-Whaler, Ted Drury, and is the nephew of current Wolf Pack GM, and Rangers Assistant GM, Chris Drury.

The “Brothers Drury” are the pride of Trumbull and are graduates of Fairfield Prep High school, Jack Drury is exploring a European option.

According to Kvalle Posten, a Swedish hockey publication Drury has been in serious discussions with the Vaxjo Lakers (Sweden-SHL), but no formal agreement has yet been yet signed. Read that HERE.

If he does sign, Drury the younger would be the 42nd college player between Division-I and Division-III to sign in Europe. He would be the 32nd under-classmen to depart early.

Drury would be the third from the ECACHL to head overseas joining Aepeli Rasanen, of Boston College (KalPa Kuopio Finland-FEL) and UCONN’s Ruslan Iskharov (Lukko Rauma Finland-FEL).

All ECACHL players are aware that next season’s hockey is very much in doubt. The fall semester has already been canceled and some schools have instituted on-campus population controls, not allowing certain groups (like sophomores for example) to be on campus to reduce possible COVID-19 exposure, but that decision destroys any reasonable hope of a sports team from having any semblance of cohesive practices or a regular season schedule.

As a 20-year-old, and soon-to-be a junior, turning pro is not unusual, but very unusual for Ivy league players, who highly value their high-end education and obtaining that degree. Other conferences 19 and 20-year-olds turning pro is commonplace.

Thus far this year, three have done so in the ECACHL, Drew O’Connor of Dartmouth College (Pittsburgh Penguins), Jack Badini (Greenwich) with the Anaheim Ducks, and fellow Crimson teammate, Jack Rathbone, who recently left for the Vancouver Canucks.

For Drury, the likely late-starting NHL and AHL seasons make it that he would most likely be looking at a late-November to an early-January, start date at this point. The irony is Carolina’s yet-to-be officially announced affiliation-switch from the Charlotte Checkers to Drury’s hometown of the Chicago Wolves will be a factor in his professional equation.

College sources state that some ECACHL schools are looking into housing their teams in an off-campus housing setting, taking online classes, and trying to salvage the 2020-21 season. The feasibility of that approach is being examined to see whether school administrators would be amenable to this arrangement that would help hockey, basketball, and a spring sport like baseball.

Nobody could have foreseen these kinds of things just a few short months ago, but these times are certainly creating questions that players need to contemplate when they made their commitment to the school.

The players selected to head to the hub cities have been made and teams have departed for Toronto and Edmonton. The Rangers and Islanders will meet in their lone exhibition game on Wednesday at 8 pm (MSG) before the playoff opener against Carolina on Saturday at 12 Noon (MSG).

Only Adam Huska was returned to Hartford and the following Wolf Pack players went to Toronto as part of the expanded 30 player roster, captain Steven Fogarty, Vinni Lettieri, Danny O’Regan, Vitali Kravtsov, Darren Raddysh, and Libor Hajek.

The following players were returned to their AHL teams; Ken Agostino (Yale) Toronto Marlies, Sam Anas (Quinnipiac) Iowa Wild, Paul Carey (Salisbury Prep) Providence Bruins, Chad Krys (Ridgefield) Rockford Ice Hogs and the Bridgeport Sound Tigers received Kieffer Bellows, Grant Hutton, Oliver Wahlstrom, and Jakub Skarek.

A few current player notes.

Derek Hulak of Manitoba signs with HC Thurgau (Switzerland-LNB). Cory Conacher of Syracuse had his deal with HC Lausanne (Switzerland-LNA) officially announced as did his new Swiss teammate ex-Pack, Brian Gibbons (Salisbury Prep). Both Conacher and Gibbons are not on the 30 player roster of Tampa Bay and Carolina respectively.

Joe Veleno of Grands Rapids is said to be talking with HC Ocelari Trinec (Czech Republic-CEL) and Latvian Rudolf Balcers. He might be leaving the Belleville Senators with Dynamo Riga (Latvia-KHL) making 48 AHL players that are signed for Europe with 21 of 31 AHL teams that have lost at least one player.  Some Euro signings could be bridge deals until the NHL or AHL season begins. For example, Vancouver loaned 2019 second-round pick Nils Hoglander to Rogle BK (Sweden-SHL) to start the 20-21 season.

Three ex-Sound Tigers have moved. Defenseman Jesse Graham re-signs with KalPa Kuopio (Finland-FEL), Graeme McCormack stays in Slovakia to play with SLEL HK Dukla Michalovce and Chad Costello changes teams in the German DEL going from the Krefeld Penguin to the Iserlohn Roosters.

Brady Shaw, the son of ex-Whaler Brad Shaw, leaves Ft. Wayne Comets (ECHL) and signs with Esbjerg (Denmark-DHL),

Two college goalies going pro, one in the U.S. and the other stays home in North Atlantic as a sophomore, Daniel Lebedeff, leaves the University of Wisconsin Badgers (Big 10) to become the sixth Badger to depart after last season (fourth leaving early) and signing a pro deal with HPK Hameenlinna (Finland-FEL) citing the uncertainty of the whether there will be a college hockey season and of course the pandemic.

Robert Lackey of the Providence College Friars (HE) leaves after his grad transfer year with a Harvard diploma and signs with the Orlando Solar Bears (ECHL).

More schools and conferences in Division I and III have elected to shut the doors on athletics for the fall.

The latest, Quinnipiac University (Hamden in the ECAC), but a non-Ivy school in the MAAC (Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference), the University of Hartford (American East), Post University in Waterbury (Northeast-10), and the University of St. Joseph’s and Albertus Magnus College (New Haven).

The Danbury Colonials (NA3HL) Kyle McEnany makes a commit to Division-III’s University of Southern Maine Huskies (NEHC) located in Portland, Maine.