Midweek Roundup: April 13, 2022
Michigan sees a number of key pieces from the 21-22 team move on to the show, and questions abound about Mel Pearson’s future in Ann Arbor
Well, there is no more Michigan hockey to report on, but that doesn’t mean we are without news. A coterie of Wolverines have signed NHL contracts, and, speaking of contracts, head coach Mel Pearson doesn’t have one moving forward.
Before we get to anything Wolverine related though, we will open with a begrudging congratulations to the Denver Pioneers, newly reigning national champions after a five-goal third period to come from behind and beat Minnesota State last Saturday.
Newly Minted Pro Blue
In the immediate aftermath of Michigan’s season-ending defeat to the aforementioned Pios, Owen Power (Buffalo), Matty Beniers (Seattle), and Kent Johnson (Columbus)—picks one, two, and five in last summer’s draft—signed entry-level NHL contracts. Of those three, only Johnson’s choice to turn pro was at all in question, and, even then, a professional contract always felt like the likely conclusion to the season for the British Columbian winger.
Captain Nick Blankenburg—graduating, but undrafted—signed a contract to join Johnson (and fellow Michigan alum Zach Werenski) with the Blue Jackets. That Blankenburg would be leaving Ann Arbor was not up for debate, but, given his small stature and comparative lack of pedigree, his NHL future was murky. His profile as an under-sized, dynamic offensive defenseman evokes comparisons to St. Louis Blues defender Torrey Krug, yet NHL coaches often appear reluctant to take advantage of players’ fitting that description. We at Gulo Gulo hope that Blankenburg does find himself a long-term place in the league and have no doubt as to whether his skillset could translate to the NHL. As of this writing, both Johnson and Blankenburg are slated to make their professional debuts this evening in a matchup with Montreal.
Meanwhile, Power and Beniers debuted a night ago. Power, a native of the Greater Toronto Area, opened his career in Toronto to play the Leafs, and his Sabres earned a 5-2 victory with a small army of friends and family looking on. For a shift-by-shift breakdown of his first period as a pro, check out the latest from tactics guru Jack Han.
Beniers picked up an assist in the first period of his first game via an impressive bit of forechecking followed by a lovely cross-ice pass to Ryan Donato in a losing effort for the Kraken.
The next two dominos to fall were Thomas Bordeleau and Brendan Brisson, both of whom signed Amateur Tryout Contracts (ATOs) with the AHL affiliates of the clubs that drafted them. Bordeleau inked his deal with the Sharks’ affiliate, the Barracuda (also based in San Jose), while Brisson signed with the Golden Knights’ affiliate, the Henderson Silver Knights.
In Brisson’s case, signing an AHL ATO may be an attempt at managing salary cap problems that have plagued Vegas since about their second season in the league. CapFriendly.com currently shows the Knights with exactly $0 of cap space at present. When the postseason begins, the salary cap dissipates, and Brisson may well find himself in the show.
For Bordeleau, the reason for an ATO is less clear. The Sharks are comfortably out of the running for the postseason and have about $5 million to spare against the cap. For the time being, it appears San Jose’s plan is to give Bordeleau the opportunity to ripen at the AHL level before plying his craft at the top of the sport.
For both players, the outcome (turning professional after their sophomore years) did not come as a surprise, though we at Gulo Gulo held out desperate hope that one or both might find the prospect of a third season in Ann Arbor more palatable than a potential year in the A, but alas it wasn’t to be.
The next news came from Michigan’s grind line of Garrett Van Wyhe, Jimmy Lambert, and Nolan Moyle. The former signed an AHL deal with the Utica Comets (the New Jersey Devils’ affiliate), while the latter two entered the NCAA’s transfer portal, looking to take advantage of the bonus year of eligibility they accrued as a result of COVID.
Finally (at least for now), Johnny Beecher signed an ATO with the Boston Bruins, who had selected him in the first round back in 2019. Of all the players to have signed pro deals thus far, Beecher was perhaps the most likely to return for one last season of NCAA hockey, but again, it was not to be. That the Bruins are organizationally desperate for (long-term) center depth likely played a role in Beecher’s process.
The best news to come out of the last week for Wolverine fans was confirmation that Erik Portillo would be returning for a third season in Ann Arbor and second as a starter. The towering Swede posted a .926 save percentage and 2.14 goals against average across forty-two starts, the only Wolverine to play in all of his team’s games this season.
Though he lacks the star power of the likes of Power or Beniers, Portillo’s decision had the greatest potential to swing Michigan’s 2022-23 season. First off, you have the simple fact that a goaltender, by nature of their position, has a greater impact than any individual skater. Then, you have the genuine ambivalence as to what the best move for Portillo would be.
On the one hand, the Buffalo Sabres (who currently hold his NHL rights) have no clear option in net for next season, and their other goaltending prospect of note (Northeastern’s Devon Levi) had already announced his decision to return to school. As such, there was a clear path for Portillo to cement his place within the Sabres’ organizational structure.
On the other hand, players are no longer beholden to the team that drafted them four years after they are selected. This means, for most NCAA players, if they wait until after their senior season to go pro, they can become free agents. Portillo, though, played an extra season in Sweden before coming to Michigan, meaning that he could become a free agent after his junior season. Thus, spending one extra year in school opens the door for professional autonomy.
That Portillo has decided to return, along with the arrival of another stacked recruiting class, immediately reasserts the Wolverines into the NCAA’s elite class entering next season.
To that end, even with the numerous vital departures, there is reason for optimism about the season to come. At this point, no news seems to be good news with regard to the other drafted Wolverines (Luke Hughes, Mackie Samoskevich, Jacob Truscott, Dylan Duke, Ethan Edwards, and Eric Ciccolini) returning for another year.
Of that group, Hughes (the number four overall pick in last summer’s draft to the Devils) seemed to have the best prospect of playing NHL minutes this year and next. At the time he was drafted, the lanky defenseman was presented as something of a long-term project, but after a sterling freshman season featuring seventeen goals, a jump to the show became a very real possibility. However, at least for now, it appears Hughes will stick to what seemed his initial plan of spending two seasons with the Maize and Blue.
Samoskevich, who finished his freshman season with ten goals and nineteen assists, also seemed a possibility to move on from the Wolverines, but instead his (apparent) return spells wonderful news. Along with Duke, Samoskevich was one of Michigan’s best players in the semi-final defeat to Denver, seeming to find the space he needed to create in wide areas of the rink while many of his teammates were flummoxed through the middle.
The Pearson Conundrum
With the season’s conclusion, Mel Pearson’s five-year contract—the one he signed when he was confirmed as Red Berenson’s successor in April of 2017—is out of term. Under normal circumstances, re-upping Pearson would seem a no-brainer.
He hasn’t yet won the big one, but he has guided his team to the Frozen Four in two of the three seasons that COVID hasn’t precluded his teams from participating in the tournament. From a recruiting perspective, the Wolverines are a juggernaut, such that losing a bevy of talent to the NHL isn’t enough to kill off their aspirations for the season to come.
Failing to win a national title with the talent available to him this season invariably exposes Pearson to nit-picking criticisms. Perhaps he could have done more to drill his team on defensive zone coverage. Perhaps he could have experimented with more different line combinations to open up more possibilities for in-game adjustment when it became clear the team was struggling against Denver. Yet neither of those critiques would come close to justifying replacing Pearson if his on-ice coaching were the only piece to the conversation.
All else being equal, there appears more than enough evidence to hope that, with a few more bites at the apple, Pearson could take his team to the top of NCAA hockey’s mountain. As Michigan fans well know from the experience of Jim Harbaugh contract negotiations the last two off-seasons, it is exceedingly rare for a collegiate coach to even make it to the point where they have just one season left on their contract (based on the notion that lame duck status would be detrimental on the recruiting trail).
However, the impending negotiations (or perhaps lack thereof) are clouded by an ongoing investigation into allegations of a toxic culture within his program. As the Michigan Daily’s Connor Earegood points out, preemptively letting go of Pearson has the potential to allow the investigation to end without need for a full report to be released according to the University’s policies. Then, of course, there is the possibility that the results of the investigation necessitate his departure.
There is also reason to believe that while Michigan would not choose to oust Pearson, it’s not as though he is irreplaceable. Without doubt, the lifeblood of Pearson’s program is recruiting; the talent he has ushered into Ann Arbor is nothing short of transcendent. This is not to say that Pearson is worthless as a tactician or motivator; in fact, we at Gulo Gulo love the way he affords his players ample freedom on the ice. Pearson is never one to staple a forward to the bench for turning the puck over while attempting a skillful play at the blue line, and we appreciate that about him. However, recruiting is clearly the key to the program as currently constituted, and it does feel fair to wonder just how essential Pearson is to the recruiting infrastructure he oversees.
Given Michigan’s hefty budget, geographic advantages (the school is not just in one of the three central hotbeds of American youth hockey, it is just a few miles down State Route 14 from the headquarters of the National Team Development Program in Plymouth), and storied tradition, it does not feel as though there is only one man who could possibly do this job.
To be absolutely clear, Pearson’s on-ice performance and results ought to have nothing to do with the investigation. It would feel inappropriate to reluctantly fire the coach, if only because you felt confident as a program you could replace him if you had to. However, within the world of high-level American sport, it is difficult not to feel some degree of cynicism about that fact proving relevant to the school’s eventual decision.
We have no sense of what a search process would actually look like for Michigan hockey, given that Pearson was something of an earmarked heir-apparent for Berenson, who took the reins in 1984.
If Pearson ends up out, it would seem most likely that the Wolverines opted for an outside hire, attempting a hard reset after what would in that scenario no longer be alleged improprieties on behalf of the coach. However, assistant coach Brandon Naurato, who only arrived this season (and thus after the events supposedly targeted by the investigation) and has earned plaudits for his understanding of player development and for his role in orchestrating this season’s power play, may end up appearing a viable (and perhaps even likely) candidate.
At this point, there is nothing to do but wait and see how Michigan chooses to proceed, but, at some point soon, there will be a press release out of the program of enormous significance.