If I was Jerry York the coach of the Boston College Eagles I would be a little bit worried because an NHL coach is trying to get one of my top/key players from my hockey team to sign a professional contract. That’s the breaks you get sometimes when you recruit top notch blue chip players. According to Rick Carpiniello Torts would like to see Kreider get into their system as soon as possible.
Ranger Report Blog --- “I’m not sure if (he’s ready for) the National Hockey League, and even next year I’m not sure if it’s the National Hockey League if he does turn pro. But I think the sooner that you get into that grind of the American League, if that’s where you start, the better, because that’s where you learn to play the game. It’s a different game than college hockey. And I can understand. I don’t get into the personal matters as far as education. I think education’s important. I think this is a family decision. But as a coach, we want to sink our teeth into him as quickly as possible as far as getting him into a situation, to a Ranger, as quickly as possible.
“I had conversations with Ryan (McDonagh), I had conversations with (Derek Stepan) over the summer, and I had conversations with Kreider also. McDonagh and Step decided to come out, and I think that’s their call, and it’s Kreider’s call also as far as staying in (college). Selfishly for us, we want to get him to us and get working with him immediately.
“And even us, our discussions with him, are we going to hurt him by trying to get him in too quickly? So you’ve got to be careful. So we felt in watching Kreider, and all three of those guys when we talked to them, that we felt they were ready and we weren’t going to hurt them. McDonagh and Step decided to come and they’re playing with us right now. Kreider decided not to, which is fine. I’m sure he learned more going through the Beanpot and all these things, and all the World Championship games and stuff like that. It’s still a good training ground. So you’ve got to be really careful who you’re trying to get to turn pro because you may hurt them as a player, too, if you don’t allow them to develop where they’re at.”
This is what former Wisconsin Badger Ryan McDonagh had to say about playing in the AHL. I find these comments to be very interesting, not really an endorsement for college hockey coming from Torts or McDounagh… I guess I was a little off on my prediction about Ryan McDonagh as well; Goon's World thinks he can make the team out of training camp. [
Puck Daddy]
On McDonagh saying his brief time in the AHL was invaluable:
“It’s hard (as a defenseman). It’s hard. That’s the toughest position, and down there everybody’s chasing that little black thing, and just to learn the grind of the gam at that position, the quick reads you have to make—and I think he handled himself very well. We were very patient as far as … he struggled at first and he just kept on coming on, coming on, and that’s why we felt we could make a deal in getting a forward when we were struggling with so many injuries and lacking offense. As I said, we let a pretty good defenseman go in Rozy (Michal Rozsival) because we felt McDonagh was ready to take the next step, and we feel he’s played very well for us here. He’ll go through some growing pains, but he’s played very well.”
