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All Over The Place: Nurse Finishes His Junior Career |
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Again I sat down to watch Connor McDavid and the Otters take on Nurse and the Greyhounds and again I was treated to some incredible hockey by kids who will be playing in Oiler silks very soon.
ONE LAST GOODBYE
The game would prove to be Darnell Nurse's final game in the CHL and he was incredibly emotional. When the game was still in reach he scored a goal on the PP to bring the Greyhounds within 1 of the Otters. That would be as close as they got before Erie pulled away in a huge way.
Darnell Nurse plays with more passion than I think anyone in the Oilers system has in a very long time and he wears those emotions on his sleeves. His team was eliminated from the playoffs and, after 4 years in the Soo organization where they've moulded him into one of the best defenders in the league, he didn't hide the tears.
After he shook the hands of the Otters and had a slightly longer pause with soon to be teammate Connor McDavid, Nurse made sure he was the last Greyhound on the ice and he shook the hands of every teammate he had. Tears streaming down his face, Nurse closed the book on his Junior career.
He's a crier, and that's fine by me. He cares about the game, his team, and his organization. He is all in. Mentally, physically, and emotionally, Darnell Nurse is completely invested in whichever team he plays for and pretty soon that could be the Oilers. Edmonton wants people on board who hate to lose. When he makes this team I doubt there will be anybody else who hates to lose more than him.
I don't know what his career is going to look like. What I do know is that Nurse is mean, big, can skate for days, and looks like a Defenseman. Some of these junior stars look like the 4th forward on the ice (Schultz). You don't confuse Nurse with an extra winger too often. I'm pretty excited about what his future holds.
DYNAMO
I hope you watched that game because it was again the Connor McDavid show. This young man now has 19-23-42 in just 15 games. The 2nd leading scorer in the OHL playoffs has just 26 points. He had 19 points in the series against the Soo alone and that Soo team had the luxury of making the best Defenseman in the league be McDavid's shadow.
I'm not sure what to make of that except to say that McDavid is probably not of this Earth. He finished last night with another 5 points. 1 goal and 4 assists that were varying degrees of spectacular. His speed is just as deadly through the neutral zone as it is moving behind the net for the wrap around. His passing is entire sublime as well.
To parrot what has been relayed to me via others, he's so good that he's messing with my head. He makes other young players who are having amazing post seasons of their own look 2nd rate in comparison. He's so good that he's breaking my own expectations for others.
THE FORGOTTEN CENTER
Lost in the shuffle with the media's attention having been fixed on McDavid and Nurse, Leon Draisaitl is also having a great Spring. In another world he would be playing for Germany at the World Championships but right now he's leading the Rockets in scoring with 20 points in 14 games.
Again, merely leading one of the best teams in the CHL in scoring barely seems enough because of how incredible McDavid is. The big German was tailor made to be Edmonton's answer to the big pivots in the West one day, now it seems as though his future is on the wing if he wants to crack Edmonton's top 6 someday.
He can still be a C, but it might end up only being if the Oilers attempt 3 scoring lines. Instead of loading up the top 6, imagine a scenario where the Oilers try to have 3 duos and fill in around them. Think perhaps:
Pouliot RNH Eberle
Purcell McDavid Yakupov
Hall Draisaitl Lander
Hendricks Gordon Klinkhammer
No, maybe having Hall play that "low" in the order isn't ideal. But it's an option. The most likely is that one day soon Draisaitl makes the Oilers as a winger who can take draws. If that's the case then it probably makes sense for him to start the year in the AHL, but Draisaitl is one of the WHL's best players and it wouldn't shock me if he claims a spot next year on merit.
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