“I think he’s going to be one of the most dangerous players in college hockey.”
That was Brock Boeser before the start of the season, talking about Adam Gaudette. He was absolutely right.
It’s been a stunning junior season for Gaudette, who went from a fifth-round pick to a crucial part of the Canucks’ prospect pool in three years. Gaudette leads the NCAA in points with 56 in 34 games and is tied for the goal-scoring lead with 29.
That kind of production has Canucks fans hyped up to a dangerous degree when it comes to the 21-year-old centre. I’ve seen some suggest he’s a guaranteed top-six forward based on his college production and there’s some potential for disappointment. It’s not that I want to slam on the brakes, but it wouldn’t hurt to tap them a little.
The Canucks have an example of how college statistics can be misleading on their roster in Tyler Motte, whose junior year in college looks strikingly similar to Gaudette’s. Motte also had 56 points as a junior, and 32 goals in 38 games. Since then, Motte has yet to establish himself as an everyday NHLer, splitting his season between the Blue Jackets’ fourth line and their AHL affiliate before heading to Vancouver in the Thomas Vanek trade.
There are some distinct differences between Gaudette and Motte, of course, including their size: Gaudette is 6’1”, Motte is 5’10”. There’s also the fact that Gaudette scored 50+ points last season as well, so this isn’t a flash in the pan. Most importantly, however, Gaudette hasn’t had the benefit of playing with superstar teammates.
Motte was fourth in the NCAA in scoring in his junior year behind his two linemates, Kyle Connor and J.T. Compher, and also had Zach Werenski on the blueline. All three are proving themselves to be top-end talent in the NHL, particularly Connor and Werenski. Gaudette is supported by good players like Dylan Sikura, Nolan Stevens, and Jeremy Davies, but he’s the one leading the way in scoring.
We can see that relation in this WOWY chart produced by Jeremy Davis of Canucks Army. For the most part, Gaudette’s teammates perform better when on the ice with Gaudette than they do without him. There might be some concern about how he performs apart from Sikura, but that’s a smaller sample as they rarely play apart.
We can compare Gaudette to other players who have come out of college hockey. Davis also provided Gaudette’s pGPS ( Prospect Graduation Probabilities System) results, which groups Gaudette in with a cohort of players similar in age, height, and point production.
According to this system, 20.9% of players similar to Gaudette in these attributes have gone on to success as NHL players.
We can use one particularly recent player as a point of comparison: Jimmy Vesey. The two players are 91.4% similar according to pGPS. Vesey is a little taller and was a little older than Gaudette in their respective junior years, but their production was very similar. Vesey had 32 goals and 58 points in 37 games as a junior.
Vesey went back to Harvard for his senior year, then signed with the New York Rangers, where he’s been...okay. He had 16 goals and 27 points in 80 games during his rookie season and is on-pace for similar numbers this season.
If those are your expectations for Gaudette — 15+ goals and 20+ points — then you’re probably in the right ballpark.
Then there are the players that fit into Gaudette’s cohort who provide a cautionary tale. One that stands out is Ryan Potulny, a 6’0” two-way centre. He led the NCAA in scoring in his junior year, tallying 38 goals and 63 points in 41 games. A third-round pick of the Philadelphia Flyers, he was given plenty of support and opportunity to make the NHL, but could never quite break through. The most games he played in the NHL was 64 after a trade to the Edmonton Oilers, and he put up a respectable 32 points. But he was back down in the AHL the following season and played five more years in the AHL before heading overseas to play in Europe.
So that’s the other potential outcome for Gaudette: AHL star who can’t quite translate his game to the NHL. Given his drive and two-way game, that is an unlikely outcome for Gaudette, but not one that can be easily dismissed.
Fortunately, there are some more optimistic projections among Gaudette’s cohort. There’s Reilly Smith, who has 60 points in 66 games for the Vegas Golden Knights this season. Even Hall-of-Famer Brett Hull is technically in Gaudette’s cohort after you adjust for the era. It’s not that “first-line forward” is entirely out of the realm of possibility for Gaudette; it’s just really, really unlikely.
In order to come out of the NCAA and become a first-line forward, you generally have to outright dominate in a way that Gaudette has not.
Kyle Connor had 71 points in 38 games to lead the NCAA in 2015-16. The year before that, it was Jack Eichel with 71 points in 40 games. They were both freshmen at the time as well. Johnny Gaudreau was a junior when he led the NCAA in scoring in 2013-14, but he had 80 points in 40 games.
So let’s say that first-line forward is out of reach for Gaudette. No one (or barely anyone) is really suggesting he has that type of ceiling. Instead, most suggest that Gaudette can become a very good third-line centre. Given his style of play, he does project to be a Ryan Kesler type of player; at least, the version of Kesler that was a shutdown, third-line centre, before he started putting up 70+ point seasons.
More reasonable expectations for Gaudette, then, would be a third-line centre who plays a solid defensive game and puts in 15 goals and 25 points. That doesn’t set the bar too low, as that would be an excellent future for a fifth-round pick, but also doesn’t set it too high, to the point that he can only disappoint.
How soon are Canucks fans going to see Gaudette? That depends on how well he and his team perform over the next month.
Gaudette’s season could end as soon as this weekend, as Northeastern University faces the University of Massachusetts in the quarterfinals of the Hockey East tournament. Northeastern are the clear favourites and should advance to the semifinals, but nothing is guaranteed. If they lose the best-of-three series, Gaudette could potentially sign with the Canucks and play in the NHL as early as next week.
On the other hand, if Gaudette and Northeastern win the Hockey East tournament, they’ll head to the Frozen Four tournament. Even if they lose, they could be selected to play. If all goes well, Northeastern could go to the Frozen Four final, in which case Gaudette won’t be playing for the Canucks this season.
The Frozen Four final is on April 7th, which also happens to be the final game of the Canucks’ season. In that case, Gaudette will likely report to the Utica Comets on an Amateur Tryout contract.
