With some key members of the Ottawa Senators still away from the team for the Olympics, four top players from the Belleville Senators were recalled to help pick up the slack at Thursday’s practice.
Carter Yakemchuk, Tyler Boucher, Oskar Pettersson, and Arthur Kaliyev got the call, which made for better numbers and a smoother practice. But it also gave the organization a chance to check on their development as prospects.
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For the players, it’s an encouraging sign to get a call like this because it means you’re a player of interest, which not every American Hockey League player can say.
But of the four players who filled in on Thursday, Yakemchuk is easily the best bet to play NHL games this season, though a lot will depend on what the Senators look like after the trade deadline.
The 20-year-old AHL rookie, generally a man of few words, described the practice as long and hard, but “super cool.”
“I think it’s been a good year,” Yakemchuk told the media. “Obviously, the message is trying to keep getting better. You know you want to play here one day, so you just take it day-by-day and try to get better.”
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Thomas Chabot might one day be Yakemchuk’s D partner and mentor and he likes what he sees.
“Seeing him up here is always fun, and you know it’s only a matter of time before he’ll be up here,” Chabot said. “He’s so talented and the way he handles the puck and moves, he’s elite at it. So, it’s fun. Obviously, it’s more fun playing games, but still, practices are still fun to kind of come up and measure yourself up with the pace of practices.”
Yakemchuk is Belleville’s top point getter on the blue line with 25 points in 39 games. But it’s hard to ignore a team-worst minus 28, 11 notches worse than any other player on the team.
Head coach Travis Green says the club remains high on Yakemchuk as a prospect, but the organization doesn’t want to rush him. They want him to have an impact when he arrives, not just trying to keep up.
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“He’s a young prospect that we obviously have a lot of hopes for,” Green told the media. “We want him to be the best that he can be and yet also want to make sure we do right by him to make sure that when he does get his opportunity that he’s ready for it.”
Is he ready right now? That’s up for debate. Sometimes players are better in the NHL than they are in the AHL. But the timing of Yakemchuk’s NHL debut is also tied to what happens at the deadline, not to mention where the Senators are in the standings.
They certainly can’t afford many mistakes, and in the heat of a playoff chase, throwing a young player out there right now is like asking a first-time student driver to merge onto the Queensway.
Steve Warne
The Hockey News
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