It wasn’t a happy Saturday for four of the five New York Ranger prospects who saw action as three saw their teams and one was ejected for a checking to the head major penalty. At the end of Saturday’s play, we are down to just four prospects left playing (two each in both the OHL and USHL) as the NCAA season came to an end.
Gabe Perreault and Drew Fortescue saw their first year at Boston College come to a heartbreaking end after Denver University shut them out 2-0 in the finals of the NCAA Frozen Four. It was the second time this season that Denver had defeated Boston College which says a lot since Boston College only lost six games the entire season.
The story of the game was simple Denver goalie Mike Davis who stopped all 35 shots that Boston College fired at him and boy did he do a fantastic job frustrating the Boston College players. Davis was really good and I have to ask what were those who didn’t vote for Davis to win the Mike Richter Award for College Hockey’s best goalie thinking?
Gabe Perreault was limited to just three shots while Drew Fortescue did not record any as Perreault finished the season with 19-41-60 while Fortescue was 4-4-8. Both prospects have nothing to be ashamed of as they both had great seasons and cemented themselves as two of the very best prospects the Rangers have.
So the question that needs answering is do they turn pro and leave school? Fortescue the answer is a very easy no he needs t0 stay to work on improving his offense. Defensively he clearly is going to be Top Four but he has to offer some consistency on offense before he will be deemed NHL ready.
As for Perreault, if he was 6’2 190 then the Rangers would have a private Jet waiting for him in St. Paul ready to bring him to New York City to sign his pro contract. But truth be told, Perreault is listed at 5’11 165 and honestly he appears even smaller than that.
No question Perreault’s skill set is excellent but just in lower body mass he would be easy to body off the puck. The way both Michigan Tech and Quinnipiac played a physical matchup against him showed the biggest weakness in his game.
And from the whispers coming out of the Rangers, they would really prefer that Perreault attend this year’s rookie camp in July to work with the Ranger’s staff on the areas he needs improvement on and then go back to Boston College for his sophomore season/
Maybe what the Rangers should do is find a way to donate to Perreault’s NIL fund and make it worthwhile for him to stay in school. Show Perreault the difference between an AHL salary of $52, 725 (plus per diem of $83 a day) and whatever he can make from his NIL fund/
Maybe get the Dolan family to make a very generous donation to the Boston College NIL fund to take care of the Rangers future star. Perreault will be a Ranger in good time.
In the OHL, Bryce McConnell -Barker was ejected for (don’t quote me) the first time in his OHL career when the captain of the Soo Greyhounds was called for a “check to the head” major penalty at 8:32 of the second period. He was also given the game misconduct that goes along with said major penalty.
The good news for McConnell-Barker was that his teammates were able to rally behind losing their captain and defeat the Saginaw Sting in game two 5-2 to tie the series up at 1-1. The Greyhounds now have the home ice advantage as they head home for games three and four.
It does not appear that McConnell-Barker will be facing any additional punishment but you never know when it comes to the various leagues,
It was the final day of the regular season in the USHL and the two Ranger prospects playing in that league had a lot to play for. At stake was the second seed in the USHL’s Eastern Conference and the first round bye that went with it.
And the winner is Ty Henricks and his Muskegon Lumberjacks who handed the Chicago Steel a 4-1 defeat. While the Lumberjacks were defeating the Steel, Rasmus Larsson and his Green Bay Gamblers lost at him to the Madison Capitols via the shootout 3-2.
Both teams finished with 78 points in the standings but the Lumberjacks had four more wins and that was the first tiebreaker which gives the Lumberjacks the first round bye. Ty Henricks had a two-assist game starting with the primary assist on the Lumberjack’s first goal and finishing with the only assist on his teams fourth goal.
Got to give Henricks some credit as he had assists in key goals this weekend and it is a larger reason why his Lumberjacks get to sit back and await a team in the Clark Cup playoffs second round. Henricks finished his season 17-15-32 which works out to 0.53 points per game.
As for Larsson and his Gamblers, they wind up facing the Chicago Steel in the Clark Cup first round starting next week. The USHL’s first round is a best of three series with all three games in the higher seed’s home arena in this case the Gamblers.
Larsson finished his regular season with a 4-13-17 or 0.29 points per game.
