One of the few things that can salve the pain of a losing season is looking to the future. Sure, this season was a crushing disappointment, but at least we got to see the likes of Bo Horvat, Ben Hutton, Sven Baertschi, Jake Virtanen, and Jared McCann start to realize their potential.
Part of the “fun” of a losing season is keeping an eye on the prospects outside the NHL, hoping desperately that one of them might save the franchise. That’s why it sucked so much to see Hunter Shinkaruk traded away. The trade itself might end up working out for the best, but seeing Shinkaruk rack up points in the AHL provided some semblance of hope. The more modest point totals of guys like Brendan Gaunce, Jordan Subban, and Dmitry Zhukenov just don’t have the same effect.
Fortunately, there’s still one Canucks prospect piling up points outside the NHL: Brock Boeser.
The Canucks 2015 first round pick has put together an astounding freshman season at the University of North Dakota. Unlike in Junior, the average age in NCAA hockey is 22, and the average freshman is 20 years old. That makes it even more impressive to see Boeser, who just turned 19 in February, dominate the league.
In 36 games, Boeser has 25 goals and 48 points, enough to lead his conference, the NCHC, in points. It’s also good for 4th in goalscoring and 7th in points in the entire NCAA. Among freshmen, only Jets prospect Kyle Connor, who is having an absolutely ridiculous freshman season, has more goals and points.
With two games to go in the NCHC playoffs and a certain berth in the NCAA championships, Boeser has a chance to add to his already impressive totals and his current hot streak suggests he’ll do so. In his last 7 games, Boeser has 6 goals and 15 points.
Boeser has benefited from playing on North Dakota’s first line with senior, and poorly-disguised vampire, Drake Caggiula and 2014 Chicago Blackhawks first round pick Nick Schmaltz, but Boeser is arguably the best player of the three.
You can see him finishing off chances created by Caggiula and Schmaltz among his 25 goals this season, but you’ll also see how many chances he creates for himself with his strong skating, puck pursuit, and stickhandling.
Most of Boeser’s goals come courtesy of his unreal wristshot, which is positively Naslundian, and I don’t use that made-up adjective lightly. When he has space to release his shot, it’s deadly. The more encouraging sign might be how good he is at creating space to shoot, as that is what will be more difficult at the NHL level.
But he’s not picky in how he scores. He’ll score on tips, dekes, driving to the net with defenders draped all over him, tapping in passes at the backdoor, and, yes, on empty nets. His goal at 2:52 is particularly nasty, undressing the Western Michigan goaltender with a move we saw last season from Radim Vrbata.
Judging purely by numbers, Boeser has placed himself in some lofty company among North Dakota alumni. His 25 goals and 48 points have surpassed Jonathan Toews and T.J. Oshie in freshman scoring, and he’s passed Toews’ sophomore season, when he was actually the same age as Boeser, in goals and points as well.
Sure, he won’t come anywhere near Tony Hrkac’s school and NCAA record 116 points nor will he approach Kevin Maxwel’s school record 82 points from a freshman and, barring an absurd playoff performance, he won’t be reaching Zach Parise’s more recent freshman mark of 61 points.
But he’s already in the top-10 all-time in freshman goals for the University of North Dakota, passing Toews, Oshie, and ex-Canuck-turned-analyst Garry Valk along the way. He’s one goal away from Parise’s 26-goal freshman season. After that, everyone else ahead of him in goals played in the 50’s, 70’s, and 80’s, when goaltenders were literally just bundles of sticks and straw formed into a vaguely human shape.
Boeser has been compared to Kyle Okposo and Patrick Sharp, with Jim Benning drawing a parallel to Joe Pavelski. Fortunately for us, all three played in the NCAA, giving us an opportunity to further compare them to Boeser. And all three of them fell short of Boeser's freshman season.
Okposo put up a point per game in his freshman year at the University of Minnesota, finishing with 19 goals and 40 points in 40 games. Sharp had 12 goals and 27 points in 34 games in his freshman year at Vermont and also fell short of a point per game in his sophomore season, the year after he was drafted.
As for Pavelski, Boeser compares favourably right back to their time in the USHL. Pavelski had 36 goals and 69 points in 60 games in his draft year in the USHL. Boeser had 35 goals and 68 points in 57 games.
Pavelski stayed in the USHL in his first post-draft year, scoring 21 goals and 52 points in 54 games. Then, in his freshman year at Wisconsin, he had 16 goals and 45 points in 41 games. He followed that up with 23 goals and 56 points in 43 games in his sophomore season.
Now, Pavelski is one of the best players in the NHL, with 260 career goals and consistent 60+ point season. Over the last three seasons, only Alex Ovechkin has scored more goals than Pavelski.
While this would obviously be a best-case scenario, if Boeser can follow Pavelski’s career path, the Canucks won’t just have a bonafide top-six forward, they’ll have a new face of the franchise.
