Author’s note: This is part one of MGoBlog’s 2020-21 Michigan Hockey season preview. If you are unfamiliar with your author, he is a current UMich student who has been a behind-the-scenes member of the MGoTeam for a few years, and began publishing content on softball back in the winter before COVID struck. This season he’s planning to write this three-part season preview, in addition to weekly columns during the hockey season, and contributing to the Hockeycast with David Nasternak (@NastyIsland). You can follow him on Twitter at @Alex_Drain where he will hopefully be doing a lot more tweeting about Michigan hockey and a lot less about the Detroit Lions crushing his soul each week.

The last time Michigan Hockey played a game it was at Yost Ice Arena in early March. The Wolverines dispatched the Spartans in game two of a series sweep to advance to the B1G Tournament Semifinals. There they were slated to play Ohio State in a matchup that was seen as a potential “win and in” for Michigan's NCAA Tournament hopes.

Well, that game never happened, and neither did the tournament. If you’re unfamiliar with why, I assume that you recently awoke from a nine-month coma and decided to pull up MGoBlog.com as your first action of newfound consciousness. 

Anyways, with the conclusion of last season being washed out, we never got to see where the team would have ended up. The good news is that we will have real hockey again this weekend against Arizona State at Yost. With the new season just around the corner, let’s dive right into the 2020-21 MGoBlog Michigan Hockey season preview, with today’s part one looking at the forwards.

The New Guys: the Death Star is Operational

Bordeleau is one of many NTDP fruits [James Coller]

Hockey recruiting happens much unlike other college sports. In college football, a new coach can post an elite recruiting class just a year after being hired, as Jim Harbaugh did at Michigan in 2016 (a distant memory at this point, I’m sure). In basketball it’s a similar story, although sometimes it takes a few extra years to cultivate relationships at the AAU level. In hockey, it often takes 3+ years to build an excellent class. The reason is because players often commit at age 14-15, when they make the decision to either stick in the US juniors/go to Canadian minor juniors that lead to the NCAA route, or opt to enter the Canadian major juniors (OHL/QMJHL/WHL) at age 16. Thus, even though Mel Pearson was hired by Michigan in 2017, he was mostly limited to inheriting Red’s recruits, recruiting overage players in the USHL, snatching up local kids, or flipping USNTDP guys in his first few classes. But now that we’re entering year four of the Pearson era at Michigan, we’re finally at the age of kids where the current freshmen were 15 when Mel was hired, making them in the age range to be properly recruited when he arrived.

And as it stands, Mel Pearson is the best recruiter at Michigan. I know that Harbaugh had some good classes, I know that Juwan currently has America's #1 class for 2021, and I know that Hutch has consistently been an elite recruiter over her career, especially for a northern softball coach. But Mel Pearson just reeled in one of the best recruiting classes in college hockey history, if you’re going off of NHL talent. Since 1963, twenty five Michigan players have been picked in the first round. This recruiting class alone will add four to that total, three at forward. There is a good chance that in the 2021 NHL Draft five of the top twenty picks will be Michigan players (and as many as three of the top five (!)), three of which are in this class and two will come in next year, in addition to two players being picked in the top forty in the 2020 Draft who are both entering in this class. It’s absurd for college hockey standards the talent that will be flowing through the walls of Yost in the next few years.

[AFTER THE JUMP: You like talent? I like talent]

Michigan adds six forwards in this recruiting class, four of which will be/have been picked in the top forty of the NHL Draft and the other two are from who dat nobodies and should grow into solid four year college hockey players. The headliner is Kent Johnson. The 18 year-old center/winger has an October 2002 birthday, making him one of three players in this class who just missed the cutoff for the 2020 NHL Draft and will be top prizes of the ‘21 draft. Johnson is simply an offensive dynamo and is the kind of special offensive talent that doesn’t come through college hockey all that often. A projected top 5-10 pick in the upcoming draft, Johnson completely obliterated the BCHL in 2019-20 as a 17 year-old on the Trail Smoke Eaters. He posted 101 points in 52 games, finishing with 33 more points than the second best scorer on his team and 30 more points than the #2 scorer in the LEAGUE. His 1.94 PPG was a full 0.41 better than #2 in the LEAGUE, who funny enough is Philippe LaPointe (also a Michigan recruit, will be discussed later in this article).

He can also do the Legg.

Stylistically Kent Johnson draws comparisons to recent Colorado Avalanche draft pick/Boston College centerman Alex Newhook. For whichever NHL team uses a top ten pick on him in June, the pipe dream comparison is Mitch Marner of the Toronto Maple Leafs. Paraphrasing the multitude of scouting reports that exist on the internet, Johnson is a fluid skater with good edge work but he’s not explosive on his feet when projecting his game to the pro level. Instead he’s a dynamic playmaker because he processes the game at an extremely high level and has great hands. He can play either center or wing and has a quick, accurate shot to pair with his arsenal, who should be able to run Michigan’s PP and be dangerous on the PK because of his playmaking abilities. He’ll need to bulk up to hack it at the next level, but given his skillset, Johnson should be an electric college player. His comparisons to Newhook are especially interesting because of how Newhook performed as a freshman at BC last year: 42 points in 34 games. Johnson could be an instant first line, PPG guy if he adjusts to college hockey. He’s got that talent.

Next up on the list is the other player who just missed the 2020 NHL Draft cutoff and may be the one good thing to come out of COVID for Michigan athletics, Matty Beniers. Beniers was committed to Harvard but flipped to Michigan after the Ivy League canceled all sports for this school year. That’s a major coup for Michigan because Beniers is a projected top twenty pick in the 2021 NHL Draft as well, and some have projected him as high as top five. Beniers posted 41 points in 44 games for the U18 USNTDP, second behind Thomas Bordeleau (also discussed below) who is a lot older than him, and by all accounts, Beniers was the team’s best offensive player last year. A natural center, Beniers also plays the wing but is good in the faceoff dot. Scouts like his high hockey IQ, which manifests in his positioning and ability to read the game well. He’s a good skater and has the strength to be a bull in the corners and on zone entries carrying the puck up the ice, though he’s regarded more as a quick strike player than someone who plays a possession game, priding himself on using open ice very well.

Thomas Bordeleau was the other big time player from the U18 USNTDP team last year, picked 38th overall by the San Jose Sharks in the draft last month. If you attended the Michigan vs. USNTDP game at Yost last season as I did, you probably remember Bordeleau slicing through Michigan’s lackluster effort and looking like arguably the best pure offensive player on the ice, largely because he probably was (either him or Beniers). In Bordeleau, Michigan is getting exactly that, a great offensive player who flashes a ton of skill with the puck on his stick. Bordeleau is not particularly fast which scares some scouts given his undersized frame (5’9”), but he’s another high-end playmaker who is a plus on the PP.

One scouting report for Bordeleau likens him to Michael Peca, which is a comparison no other scout makes and is rather odd. For those who are either not geeky enough about hockey to know about the 1990s NHL or are too young to remember that era (your author is one of those two), Peca was one of the elite defensive centers of the late 90s alongside Michigan alum John Madden. Bordeleau is uh… not that and unless something massively changes, he will not be winning Selkes at the NHL level like Peca. The only reason I can think of for that comparison is because Bordeleau is regarded as excellent in the faceoff circle, much like Peca was, but the comparisons stop there. Michigan didn’t recruit Bordeleau for his defense, they brought him in because he’s another offensive playmaker to add firepower to the lineup.

Brendan Brisson rounds out the blue chip forwards, the 29th overall pick in the 2020 NHL Draft by the Vegas Golden Knights. Brisson is already 19 and played last season on the absolutely loaded Chicago Steel team of the USHL. He posted 59 points in 45 USHL games which was 2nd in the league in points but before you get excited, it’s worth noting that the top three were all Steel players so it’s a bit hard to parse out how much of that is Brisson and how much of it were his teammates. Scouts see Brisson as a good, agile skater that is a creative playmaker with great vision and the hands to back it up, another potential PP QB among these incoming freshmen forwards. Brisson’s shots are accurate and deceptive, and he’s an all-around real weapon to use in the offensive zone. He’s not terribly physical but works hard in his own end and didn’t get many PK chances in Chicago. Brisson can play center or wing at the collegiate level, but is probably a wing in the NHL. Scouts have thrown out comparisons to Max Domi, as well as Alex Tanguay (continuing our theme of late 90s/early 00s NHL throwback comparisons) for Brisson.

The two freshmen who are not considered top NHL prospects are Phillippe LaPointe and Josh Groll. If you’re tired of 90s NHL references by now you should probably delete this article and stop reading because LaPointe is the son of Martin LaPointe, an NHL forward who won a pair of Stanley Cups with the Red Wings in ‘97 and ‘98. LaPointe is a Feb. 2000 birthday, making him a double overager and he racked up 55 points in 36 BCHL games last year on Kent Johnson’s Trail Smoke Eaters. There’s not a ton of scouting on him and your author doesn’t watch the BCHL regularly but his statistical profile and age indicates a guy who should be ready to play college hockey right away and should be okay as a freshman, and then rounds into a good player over his 4 years at Michigan.

Groll has an Aug. 2001 birthday, so he just turned 19, and posted 42 points in 41 games for Lincoln of the USHL last year, which landed him 26th in the league and on a PPG basis, 18th. That was a big statistical jump from the year before and one Lincoln article talked about how hard he worked in the summer of ‘19 to improve, which bodes well for his work ethic. Not much is said on him on the internet but he’s a guy you start in the bottom six (if Michigan has any minutes for him at all this year) and then has a chance to play in the top six by the end of his 4 year career.

The Returners: One large NHL prospect and a group of identical known unknowns

​
[James Coller]

Michigan’s forward group from the 2019-20 season lost a lot of pieces entering this year. Jake Slaker was the team’s only near-PPG player and he exits to graduation. As does Will Lockwood and Nick Pastujov, who were 2nd and 3rd in points last year. Jacob Hayhurst rounds out a Michigan group that lost 4 of its 5 highest scoring forwards to graduation. The one who remains is Johnny Beecher, a freshman a year ago. The 30th overall pick in the 2019 NHL Draft by Boston, Beecher is a big, big boy (6’4”) who has shown some promise and should be expected to take a big step in year 2 after posting 16 points in 31 games a year ago. Beecher played the last month of last season with a broken thumb per Bailey Johnson yet was managing to play his best hockey of the year before COVID hit, scoring goals in both B1G Tourney games against MSU. Beecher is not the most explosive center but he gives Michigan a decently experienced presence in the middle who can play both special teams units and is generally more talented than most college hockey opponents. If Beecher can trend closer to a point-per-game centerman, he will be a top line player. His mix of size, skill, and speed is a rare combo in the context of NCAA hockey and should only get better as a sophomore.

Outside of Beecher, there are a lot of players who I call identical known unknowns. Many of these players are virtually indistinguishable from each other and they’re known in the sense that none have flashed consistent true top six ability. But they’re also unknowns because there’s some reason to believe that at least a couple could bust out in 2020-21; it’s just hard to know which. The seniors are Jack Becker, Luke Morgan, and Michael Pastujov. Becker has cobbled together a solid Michigan career as a netfront player but has yet to show much further upside, posting a near identical statline in all three seasons (15 points, 15 points, 12 points). Morgan was a Lake St. transfer who has shown similar ability in his two seasons at Michigan, putting up 12 and 13 points. He can play the wing or center so that gives Michigan some versatility but there hasn’t been much more there than a player who fills your bottom six. The younger Pastujov had a big sophomore year in 2018-19 with 19 points but then regressed back to 9 points last year, struggling to get much playing time and posting a dismal 5.6% shooting percentage. The big upside with this group is that as seniors, if there was ever a time to bust out, it would be now.

Two underclassmen who seem like decent bets to play this season are Eric Ciccolini and Nick Granowicz. Ciccolini was a 7th round pick of the Rangers a year ago who showed some potential as a freshman, posting 11 points in 26 games before sustaining a season-ending shoulder injury. Now in his sophomore year he should play a bigger role in Michigan’s offense as he’s got more raw talent than some of the other names in this category, which could prove important when it comes to gelling with the litany of NHL prospects I listed earlier in this article. Granowicz was the big surprise of 2019-20, coming into the program as a freshman last year as mostly an obscure recruit who didn’t seem to figure into the picture all that much. After being a healthy scratch for the early part of the year, Granowicz got a chance and caught fire when the team did in the second half, exploding for two goals in State College and then a hat trick against Wisconsin at Yost in February.

Granowicz finished with a 7-4-11 line in 22 games, playing in the top six by the end of the year. Don’t mistake him for a guy with NHL talent, but he’s a crafty player who knew where to be on the ice in order to pilfer goals his more talented teammates created. If Granowicz can keep that going there will be a place for him in this year’s lineup. Jimmy Lambert can be lumped into this group, now as a junior who has mostly been unremarkable in his Michigan career but isn’t a scrub either. His 13 points last season rounds out this group of known unknowns. All six players I’ve named thus far finished last season with between 9 and 13 points. Remember what I said about virtually indistinguishable?

The last three forwards are a bit more distinguishable because of their presence as a cohesive unit on the fourth line over the past two seasons, Garrett Van Whye, Nolan Moyle, and Dakota Raabe. Raabe rotated a bit around the lineup last year but GVW and Moyle have been sewn to the hip together since entering Michigan at the start of 2018-19 and have worked well as a tandem. They’re not a sexy pair, and if you lump Raabe in, a line, but they work hard, fight in the corners, win battles along the boards, and can kill penalties. GVW is the center and is a mainstay of Michigan’s PK, alongside Moyle who’s had a penchant for scoring big goals with the Wolverines. Raabe has shuffled around a bit over his three seasons at Michigan but all three dudes are firmly confined to the bottom half of the forward line chart.

So how does this all stack up?

[JD Scott]

Trying to figure out Michigan’s lines has been a difficult thought experiment for me as we think about the new season upon us. Thankfully we have some nuggets from this Michigan Daily article. The most notable of which is that the lines are frequently changing. However, it does note that Beecher and Ciccolini have worked well together, which is an important piece of information to keep in mind. As you’ve been reading in this article, Michigan has considerable inexperience at forward but an overload of talent, so it’s more a process of fitting the pieces together than it is trying to scavenge for options.

Five players in particular stand out as those who should be playing consistent top six minutes: Johnson, Bordeleau, Brisson, Beniers, and Beecher (nickname idea: the new killer B’s). However, since three of those five are true centers, it may be best to scatter them across three lines to ensure there’s one high-end playmaker per line. In a separate Daily article, Mel talked about the current PP setup which has Jimmy Lambert playing on the top unit and either Becker or Pastujov on the second unit. Those three players then are good bets to fill out the top nine in addition to the aforementioned five. And if Ciccolini is working with Beecher, that may be your top three lines right there.

Then the question really is how does Pearson go about assembling a fourth line? My gut would be to keep Van Whye, Moyle, and Raabe together as an effective grind line a la Draper-Maltby-McCarty (just couldn’t let the 90s references go), but Pearson may be inclined to remove Raabe and swap in Nick Granowicz, since his seven goals proved critical last year. It’s thus tough to see where LaPointe and Groll will get time as freshmen, and Luke Morgan should still be in the conversation too. The most obvious takeaway from this exercise is the reality that these lines will be fluid and the identical known unknowns will probably rotate in and out frequently this season. So, here’s my guess for base lines for the season:

Johnson - Beecher - Ciccolini

Brisson - Beniers - Lambert

Becker - Bordeleau - Pastujov

Moyle - Van Whye - Granowicz

If these are the actual lines this Saturday I will be running out to buy a lottery ticket because this is merely a stab in the dark.

As a whole, there’s a lot of uncertainty with the forwards because four of your top five most important players in this group have never played an NCAA game before. That said, there’s also sky high upside and even the modal outcome consists of a pretty good offense given the talent level. Johnny Beecher should track towards being a 1C in year 2, Kent Johnson has a shot to be a PPG guy immediately, while Beniers, Bordeleau, and Brisson should all reasonably be expected to be 15-25 point players as freshmen under a typical schedule. That would replace the outgoing parts and then some. Becker, Pastujov, and Ciccolini can all stand to benefit from the better talent around them and if each could chip in around 15-20 points (again using the old typical schedule as a gauge) as well, this could be an offense that is deep, robust, and dangerous. The bottom line won’t bring a ton of scoring threat, but will prove crucial to closing out hockey games and killing penalties.

Finally, as a sneak preview for the next post, the defense will prove to be an important component of the offense since Michigan has four capable puck-movers on the blue line. Nick Blankenburg, Cam York, Owen Power, and Jack Summers all should help the offense flow from the back end forward and create opportunities from the point. Again, it’s hard to make concrete predictions given how many new faces there are- in addition to COVID uncertainty- so your author may peer back on this article and look foolish. But it’s also pretty safe to bet the offense will be good when your top five most important forwards were or will be top 40 NHL Draft picks. Say goodbye to workman, grind it out hockey and say hello to the blue chip era: the Mel Pearson Death Star is operational.