Recap of Day 1 of Development Camp
32 Thoughts style for the people who couldn't go
They’ve messed with the order of development camp a little bit this time around, with skills drills happening on day 1 alongside technical skating drills in the second session. They split the positional groups onto the two sheets of ice at Invisalign and while I started out at the forward group, I spent the majority of my time at the defense group because there were more new guys that I wanted to see. With that, let’s dive into what I saw on Day 1 of development camp.
As of now, there is currently only one player slated to play in North America in the defense group for next year. That player is Noel Fransen, who I think Wolves fans will enjoy. The guy moves super smooth, having a super quick first few strides to be able to get up to top speed rather quickly. He moves the puck quickly and with pace. Interested to see how else he performs this week.
Kurban Limatov, holy hell that guy can skate. It’s fluid, it’s fast, it’s insane to watch. His stick handling is also really quick and twitchy.
I mentioned it before but Timur Kol has a very “pro-like” approach. It’s smooth, the passes are quick, good at retrievals.
Roman Shokhrin was the best in the retrieval drill, able to break up aerial flips into the corner and able to get the puck out quick. The hands are a little awkward right now, but that’s something that can easily be worked on.
In the most loving way possibly, William Hakansson is a unit. He lumbers when he skates (not a bad thing), and he looks like a guy who would throw a rather heavy hit. There’s some potential in the pucks skills as he had some good moments and some awkward moments.
Session 2
Session 2 focused mainly on skating, with a dedicated skating coach helping them through drills that most people don’t normally see. This, specifically when I posted a few videos, was getting some weird attention because it doesn’t look like a normal hockey drill. Shocker, that’s the point.
These drills were much more technical in nature, almost figure skater-esque drills, focusing in edge work, single leg drive and mobility, and explosiveness. I thought it was interesting that they leaned further into the figure skater like drills because it gets these guys to do something uncomfortable and learn and develop new techniques.
Kurban Limatov is the best skater in the prospect pipeline. Roman Bausov could lay claim to that but Limatov moves so smooth and he has that agility you’d covet. He probably could’ve been a figure skater in a past life.
Noel Fransen also excelled at these drills. Silky smooth skating ability.
It was great to see Cerrato moving as well as he did today. Not that I was worried but I didn’t know where he’d be with the injuries he dealt with this year
Zach Lansard is QUICK. Has great straight line speed.
Deeply apologize for not having anything about the forwards during the skills session this morning. I wanted to see the defensemen more because I hadn’t gotten in real life viewings on 4 out of the 5 (Fransen being the lone exception since he was at development camp last year). Same with the goalies, as I was locked in with the defensemen, even though they were working on the same sheet of ice.
Only one thing on the agenda tomorrow, which is the on ice testing at 1 PM. Expect a shorter post tomorrow.
Do you think Limatov is ready to take the next steps and get VHL or (hopefully) KHL time?