The Vancouver Canucks are involved with a prospect tournament before the start of every season out in Penticton B.C. Each season the Calgary Flames, Vancouver Canucks, Edmonton Oilers and Winnipeg Jets send some of their top prospects to compete with players along the same age lines and to showcase their skills. This season the Canucks have released their roster before any other team and it has a couple of interesting things I've noticed on it.
Players not attending:
Thatcher Demko isn't attending this years Young Star's tournament and I can only assume that it is because he will already be at Boston College where he currently attends school and plays for their team.
Brock Boeser is the Canucks first round pick in this years NHL Entry Draft who was also left off of the roster. Much like Demko I feel that this is because Boeser is already a University of North Dakota commit who will most likely already be there attending school.
Many people are also wondering where Curtis Valk is and why his name isn't on the roster. That's easy, it is because he isn't a prospect of the Canucks. Last season he was invited to the Young Star's tourney by the Canucks and then afterwards, the Utica Comets signed him to a contract. Utica also happens to be Vancouver's AHL affiliate.
Older Prospects:
The Canucks have added two names to their tourney roster who were not really expected to be on there. 23 year old Mike Zalewski and 24 year old Clay Witt.
Mike Zalewski is potentially still a Canucks prospect but his situation is an odd one. He was under contract with the Canucks until the end of the 2014-15 season where the Canucks opted not to re-sign him. It appears that he is going to follow the same path that Valk did last season. I would expect him to be signed by Utica or potentially a different AHL or ECHL team.
Clay Witt is a 24 year old goaltending prospect who is arriving in Penticton after spending last season with Northeastern in the NCAA. He could possibly be the replacement for Demko for the tourney.
There is also a lot of speculation about how the Canucks can get away with these older players? The answer is because as long as the player hasn't played in 25 or more games in the NHL, they are able to attend the prospect tournament. Which is why you will not see Sven Baertschi's name on the roster.
The last thing that I noticed when going over the Canucks roster was that there has been a position change for a player.
Mackenze Stewart has changed from defense to forward according to the roster. He is one of the biggest players attending the tourney for the Canucks at 6'3" and 216 lb's, so it is possible that Vancouver is transitioning him into a new role. He has the size and strength to be a power forward if he can adapt to playing on the front end instead of manning the blueline.
Stewart plays for the WHL's Prince Albert Raiders, so as the season moves along, it will be worth tracking him and where he is playing position wise.
As it stands, there are 13 players who are attending this tournament that are under contract with the club (according to Generalfanager.com). I would also expect to see about 8-10 players be invited to main camp later in September. Players like Hunter Shinkaruk, Jake Virtanen, Ben Hutton and Jared McCann. Just so they get a taste of what is expected of them over the next few seasons.
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