It's been a couple months since I last did a Hockey Weekly piece. The previous one checked in on the Mel saga, talked about the transfer portal, and then checked off a few odds and ends. Today's will be similar- we know how the Mel saga ended, so instead I will devote time to digging into new head coach Brandon Naurato before checking off some offseason topics including the non-conference schedule release, the NHL Draft, and the World Juniors. 

Hello: Brandon Naurato 

I wrote a little bit about Naurato on Sunday when he was announced as the interim head coach of Michigan Hockey and David and I discussed him on the HockeyCast yesterday. As a brief primer, I will quote what I wrote on Sunday here first: 

Naurato is a 37-year-old who has one year of experience as a coach at Michigan but glowing reviews. Michigan Hockey fans of the late 2000s may remember Naurato as a rather middling forward on the late 2000s juggernaut teams (including the 2008 Frozen Four squad), where he played 130 career games for the Wolverines, scoring 32 goals and 32 assists in his career. After that, Naurato bounced around the lower minor leagues before retiring from his playing career at age 27 in 2012. 

After retiring, Naurato became a skills specialist and hockey consultant in the Metro Detroit area (Naurato is a Livonia native), specializing in prospect development. He founded his own business, Naurato Consulting, and in the 2010s he worked with nearly every notable Michigan player who went to the NHL during the summers, from Connor to Copp to Hughes to Larkin to Werenski. His excellence as a development coach led the Red Wings to hire Nuarato in a player development capacity in both Detroit and Grand Rapids, with the AHL affiliate. Last fall, Michigan hired Naurato to join the staff as an assistant. 

That's the sort of information you can glean from the Michigan Hockey bio of Naurato, but let's try and dig a little deeper. As I said on the podcast, Mel's decision to hire Naurato seemed to come from asking his players "what did you do in the summer?" and they all replied "working with Brandon Naurato", after which he made the logical next step to bring the guy on board. He explained as much in this short video from around the time Naurato was hired: 

Brandon Naurato returns to Ann Arbor - a home run hire for Michigan Hockey#GoBlue〽️ pic.twitter.com/IavE6gGbTB

— Michigan Hockey (@umichhockey) September 3, 2021

Little did he know, he was actually hiring his replacement. Connor Earegood of the Michigan Daily has a collection of good quotes from players last season citing Naurato as the reason they improved in different facets of the game and he wrote in his introductory column on Naurato that the youthful assistant's primary responsibility had been the power play. While there wasn't the sort of gigantic PP improvement like we saw with the PK when Kris Mayotte was on staff, Michigan did improve last year on the PP, from 23.7% (7th) to 26.8% (3rd). Coaching a PP with the talent Michigan had on it last season is kind of like teaching Clayton Kershaw how to pitch, but at least it's a point in Naurato's favor as a piece of evidence that he can coach team hockey.

[AFTER THE JUMP: digging into the paper trail] 

[Michigan Athletics]

What's perhaps more interesting about Naurato is the long paper trail he leaves behind from the 2010s. During his days as a consultant, he was basically a small-time, freelancing hockey analyst who was not all that different from your author. In that capacity, he did lots of public analysis that anyone can pull up and read to get a window into Naurato's hockey mind. One of Naurato's big hobbies was collecting tracking data and breaking down tape, much like such popular NHL twitter accounts as the great Corey Sznajder (@ShutdownLine) or Dimitri Filipovic (@DimFilipovic). In this piece, Naurato and Topher Scott revealed the results of tracking every single power play goal from the 2017-18 NHL season and what the raw data said. Here's an excerpt: 

Our Top 13 Takeaways from the data:

1. It’s really important to have a player on the ice at the backside position whose shot strikes fear in the other team. Take a look at the players from the Top 8 teams with the highest PP percentage in the league:

Ovechkin. Laine. Stamkos. Pastrnak. MacKinnon. Kessel/Malkin. All proven scorers that can rip a puck (Bozak was the player on Toronto’s first unit, Barzal with the Islanders…not sure they fit into this category).

If you can have a player that can score from distance, particularly on a one-timer, it will spread the PK out as they have to shade and account for that shot.  It just opens up so many more options for the other players on the ice.  And if the opponent doesn’t pay extra attention to them…GOAL.  These guys don’t miss much when they get the opportunity.

2. Most power plays ran the same system (1-3-1), with varying degrees with what they were trying to accomplish. Some teams like to have the halfwall player on their Forehand side (Wheeler/Marner) while most utilized a player on their off-side (Kane/Kucherov). Some power plays used the bumper as a shooter, some used him as more of a release guy that distributed the puck. Some power plays liked to have a defenseman up top that had a one-time threat with the halfwall player while others like to have that Dman on his forehand side to better be able to walk the line.  But at the end of the day…90% of the teams used the 1-3-1 structure.

Reading this, it's really not hard to see how Naurato was chosen to coach Michigan's PP last year. This piece was as dense and detailed as it gets, a treasure trove of data showing how Naurato did the exhaustive work of tracking but still had enough energy to break it down. At the very least, we can say he thinks deeply about problems and scenarios involving hockey. Around that same time, Naurato also guest-wrote a piece over at The Athletic where he analyzed the Red Wings' offense for the 2017-18 season in a similar fashion, using his own tracking data and integrating clips. I'd recommend taking a look at that one too, but for those without subscriptions, these are the top comments on the story: 

"holy cow this is really good"

"The ability to identify strengths and weaknesses using analytics, convey team needs in a strategically articulated way to achieve success moving forward... Very impressive! Look forward to reading more from Brandon soon" 

"I'm not huge into the advance analytics, but you made this very easy to understand and did a fantastic job in the comparisons" 

Naurato has also appeared on podcasts to talk hockey, including one, Hockey Think Tank, from only a few months back. He is someone who very clearly loves to grab a cup of coffee and talk about the sport with just about everyone and also the kind of hockey coach who thinks no piece of data or statistic is irrelevant. Someone who wants as much information as possible, visual or statistical, to inform the way he thinks about and coaches the game. For me, that's a very welcome development in the world of the stodgy 200 Hockey Men who are proud of their ignorance, if for no other reason than the fact Naurato now may be one of the most successful ex-hockey bloggers in the world. People like me feel seen. 

But what does this all mean about Naurato's ability to coach? 

It's really the big mystery and it represents the biggest leap of faith that Michigan Hockey has taken in almost a century. Mel Pearson had turned Michigan Tech's program around as a head coach, in addition to more than a decade as an assistant. Red Berenson had been a head coach in the NHL before he took the Michigan job. John Giordano had been an NCAA assistant for just one year, like Naurato, but he had been a high school head coach for a decade. By my count, we have to go all the way back to the first coach, Joseph Barss (1922-1927), to find a Michigan head coach who had A) never been a head coach at any level and B) had 1 year or less NCAA assistant coaching experience. That does seem a bit nervewracking. 

[NHL.com]

On the other hand, Naurato is clearly a bright guy who does a rigorous amount of homework and is someone that a lot of people in the industry think is the next hockey whiz kid. For example, Naurato was featured in The Athletic's 40 Under 40 in hockey list back in 2018 along with the quote "(Naurato is) the most knowledgeable guy I have ever met in hockey" from Zach freakin' Werenski. Naurato also has lots of experience working with high level players, just not in a technical "coach" capacity. That's not a bad profile to bet on if you were ever going to hand the keys to the biggest name brand car in college hockey to someone with this little experience. And thankfully, he is being set up to succeed, with a very talented roster, one that he knows well, and one that has a recent tradition of winning. There is some turnover on the roster from last year but Michigan is arguably still the most talented team in college hockey (either them or Minnesota in my mind) and they're coming off a season in which they went 31-10-1 and made the Frozen Four. 

Michigan also needs to continue to work to make sure that Naurato succeeds. They have already announced that Bill Muckalt is staying on staff, which is interesting because 1) Muckalt has been nearly sewn to the hip with Mel over his career and I wasn't sure he'd survive the report and 2) Muckalt got passed over for the big job by a guy 11 years his junior and with vastly less experience. I thought there was a chance he'd bail in frustration with the university. But instead, he's staying and I certainly don't hate that. Muckalt has many more years of experience behind a college bench as an assistant, and was briefly a head coach in the USHL. That's a solid veteran presence who has more experience running the systems side of thing than Naurato does. It also ensures further continuity overall.

But they have an extra assistant job to fill and that's what's interesting. I've been clamoring for a veteran presence to help steady the ship, but maybe Michigan thinks Muckalt is that and they go and try and get someone like Chad Kolarik. A former teammate of Naurato's, Kolarik recently ended his playing career and just spent a season as a USHL assistant and now is planning to join the USA staff in some capacity. What does seem true is that some candidates are perhaps not as interested in leaving their current job in August to be an assistant for an interim head coach knowing that if Naurato doesn't work out, they could be broomed out next spring if, say, Rand Pecknold is hired and he wants to bring his guys in. 

For some reason this photo is in our Flickr [Paul]

On the recruiting front, I think Naurato should be just fine. He's in communication with all the recruits already by virtue of being on the staff and it feels notable that the program chose Naurato as the guy to give the quotes about the incoming recruits back in February. Speaking frankly, I think the 37-year-old who played NCAA and minor league hockey within the last 15 years may be more relatable to teenage hockey players than the 63-year-old who wants to discuss his father's 1940s childhood in Flin Flon, Manitoba. Especially when he seems to still be good enough on skates to score shootout goals in drills against Michigan's goalies. Mel, of course, was a tremendous recruiter and so I guess my thesis here is that Naurato should be perfectly capable at keeping the train on the tracks *assuming he does well at coaching this season*. There's a very real scenario here where Michigan has a winning record, gets a top 10 national seed in the NCAAs, and the recruiting momentum doesn't skip a beat. 

In that way, I'm ultimately glad they gave Naurato a shot. I said to David that among the top tier of interested candidates, Pecknold, Jeff Blashill, Mayotte, and Naurato, you could've convinced me on any of the four, but Naurato is the biggest home run swing and I like the idea of swinging for the fences. Jeff Blashill has an excellent track record pre-NHL, but if he takes the job, you know he's only coming here as a way to get back to the league one day. With Pecknold, you're talking about a 55-year-old who would be older than Mel was when he took the job in 2017. Mayotte is a guy who is also young and also inexperienced as a head coach, but ensures less continuity. 

With Naurato, you get the youngest candidate and the most continuity, and also the only one who would be coaching at his alma mater and thus has perhaps the least chance of leaving for the NHL(?). He's the kind of candidate where if it works, he could be your coach for decades. Why not give that a trial run, knowing that if it fails you can have almost anyone you want next spring? For a process that was largely bungled by Warde Manuel, the conclusion is far from the worst-case scenario. 

Rutger and Frank together at the draft [ESPN screenshot]

The NHL Draft and Roster Notes 

In the time since our last column, the 2022 NHL Entry Draft came and went. It was a gold mine for NHL fans as a host of shocking selections and trades made it one of the more intriguing drafts in years, but for Michigan purposes, we need to see how the incoming recruits did. Center Frank Nazar was chosen 13th overall by the rebuilding Chicago Blackhawks, which was more or less in line with the pre-draft selections. Chicago clearly prioritized Nazar's high-ceiling toolkit of skating and goalscoring in selecting him in the lottery. 

Incoming winger Rutger McGroarty was picked just one slot later by the Winnipeg Jets, which was a decent bit higher than his pre-draft projections. McGroarty makes his living battling in the corners and around the net so the Jets seemed to want to add an element of toughness to their prospect pool. Seeing Rutger go to Winnipeg was really not surprising when you consider the history that GM Kevin Cheveldayoff has in prioritizing Michigan guys. In his decade at the helm in Winnipeg, Chevy has also used first rounders on Jacob Trouba (2012) and Kyle Connor (2015), as well as a one-time Michigan commit Cole Perfetti (2020), and he used a fourth-rounder in 2013 on Andrew Copp. The Ann Arbor ---> Winnipeg pipeline continues. 

Speaking of Ann Arbor --> NHL pipelines, there is now a certifiable one surrounding defensemen and New Jersey. For the third straight draft, GM Tom Fitzgerald of the New Jersey Devils used a pick in the top three rounds on a Michigan defenseman. Seamus Casey went in the 2nd round, 46th overall to the Devils, following Luke Hughes (1st, 2021) and Ethan Edwards (3rd, 2020). The Devils clearly have a mold for what they want their defensive prospects to look like, and evidently that mold looks a lot like what Michigan prefers: puck-moving, smooth-skating offensive defensemen with transitional value who are on the skinnier side. Needless to say, there should be lots of Devils scouts in the Yost press box this season. 

[James Coller]

With this draft in the books, we can now assess the talent level of the roster for the upcoming season. Though the roster has yet to be formally announced, we are building this off of the players known to be returning and all the recruits who are assumed to be coming in. One quick note: Michigan did lose Hunter Brzustewicz during the offseason, as he defected to the Kitchener Rangers of the OHL. I'm not terribly surprised by this, as I had heard some intel that the CHL path may be better suited to fit the ways Brzustewicz needs to develop. Playing time was also a possible concern, with Edwards, Hughes, Casey, Truscott, Pehrson, and possibly Holtz ahead of Brzustewicz on the depth chart. For a player who wants to play his way into the first round of the '23 draft, it made some sense. 

Anyway, back to the talent-level thing. Here is a breakdown of where Michigan's roster sits by draft position: 

• 1st rounder (6): Samoskevich, L. Hughes, Nazar, McGroarty, A. Fantilli+, Brindley+ 
• 2nd rounder (1): Casey 
• 3rd rounder (3): Portillo, Edwards, Hallum 
• 4th rounder (1): Duke 
• 5th rounder (1): Truscott
• 7th rounder (2): Ciccolini, Draper 
• Undrafted (13): Pehrson, Holtz, Lapointe, Moyle, West, Granowicz, Keranen, Estapa, Druskinis, L. Fantilli, Miles, TJ Hughes, Shea 

The (+) by Adam Fantilli and Gavin Brindley indicate where they are expected to be drafted in the 2023 NHL Entry Draft based on current projections. As a whole, 14 of the 27 players are drafted and 13 are not. That's a very high proportion for a college hockey team and with 10 in the top three rounds, Michigan is still an ultra-talented team. Maybe not the legendary status of last season when you had four in the top five picks of a single draft, but Naurato will not have a roster lacking NHL juice by any stretch. 

Western stays on the schedule [JD Scott]

Schedule Bits 

While we are still waiting on the chronically slow B1G to put out the conference slate, the non-conference schedule was announced a few weeks back during the Mel mystery saga. Given that we know what the B1G slate will say (four games against each of the other six teams), we now have the full list of opponents. In the non-conference, Michigan will start with its typical exhibition against sacrificial lamb University of Windsor, and then will host Lindenwood, host Boston U, go to Lake State, and do a home-and-home with Western to start the first month of the season. After three weeks of B1G play, they will host Harvard over Thanksgiving weekend and then will play their USNTDP exhibition on January 6. 

As you may have noticed there, Michigan is declining to play any regulation games of any kind over the WJC, which will run from December 26, 2022 to January 5, 2023. Last time I wrote a hockey column, I noted Michigan's decision to pull out of the "GLI" and wondered whether they'd schedule layup games over the holiday break instead. Turns out, they opted not to. I honestly would have liked to move the Lindenwood series to over the Christmas break and fill that opening weekend with someone a bit more challenging, but I get the thought process. For those who are unfamiliar, Lindenwood is a university in St. Louis that is moving up from club level to Division 1 for this coming season and thus are likely to be very, very bad. They are the kind of team Michigan could've handled even with their WJC guys away.

Michigan played 11 non-conference games last season and were slated to play 12 until the GLI incident. This schedule has them playing just 10, which is why I would've moved the Lindenwood series to Christmas and filled the hole. That said, the schedule is definitely a very solid one. Outside of what should be a massacre against Lindenwood, the other 8 games are against opponents who are somewhere between solid and good. The opponents on the schedule outside of the Lions finished 17th, 32nd, 3rd, and 18th last season in PWR. Not the most difficult non-conference schedule and definitely a bit of a fall from last year when Duluth and Minnesota State were on the schedule, but I don't have any issues with this. Michigan should be able to notch some decent wins while not setting the degree of difficulty too tough for a young team that will be still in the jelling process in the opening month of the season. 

[James Coller]

August WJC?

Our final note is about the currently ongoing WJC which is taking place in, yes, August. This is because last year's WJC fell apart due to the Omicron surge and the IIHF's inexplicable decision not to bubble and have the teams stay in the same hotel as a large open-air wedding reception, with guests strolling through the lobby and coughing on Luke Hughes. The tournament is still being held in Edmonton but attendance seems lackluster as most Canadians are currently in Muskoka at the cottage. 

This tournament is relevant for our purposes because several Michigan players made the cut and it gives a window into who will be heading to the 2023 WJC out in Halifax in just a few months' time. Kent Johnson is suiting up for Team Canada while Thomas Bordeleau, Mackie Samoskevich, Luke Hughes, and Jacob Truscott are playing for Team USA. In particular, this was really nice to see for Bordeleau, who was not on the roster in the December first try of this event, the second straight year he was going to miss the tournament due to testing positive for COVID. Instead, he gets to be on the roster and is wearing an "A" for his team. 

The tournament got started last night for Team USA in a routine rout of Germany and Luke Hughes opened the scoring, with an assist from Bordeleau: 

The eagle is back. #WorldJuniors 🇺🇸 pic.twitter.com/9wRaRMmqGn

— USA Hockey (@usahockey) August 10, 2022

Another note from this is that Frank Nazar was one of the last couple cuts for Team USA. Given that there are a chunk of players, like Bordeleau, who will age out and be ineligible for the tournament in December, I would expect to see Nazar on the upcoming roster. Similarly, I think Rutger McGroarty will get a longer look for that roster than he did for this one. If you are interested in watching some of the Michigan players, Team USA plays again in the group stage tomorrow night at 10 pm, Saturday at 2 pm, and Sunday at 10 pm. All games will be on NHL Network in the US and one of the TSNs in Canada.