A lacrosse goal among surprises as Carolina Hurricanes wrap up prospect tournament

When you throw a bunch of young kids who don’t know each other very well together with a young coach who doesn’t know them at all, there are going to be some surprises. The four days of the Carolina Hurricanes’ rookie tournament ended Monday afternoon with a couple big ones.

Start with Alexander Pashin’s lacrosse goal, which not only came out of nowhere but saw him tuck the puck in a very tight space above the Tampa Bay Lightning goalie’s right shoulder. Pashin, who came over from Russia this summer, doesn’t speak much English but said a lot with that play.

“I didn’t know he had it in the bag,” said Jamieson Rees, who set up the goal.

Brock Sheahan, newly arrived to coach the Hurricanes’ prospects before taking over the AHL Chicago Wolves this fall, was probably the least surprised of anyone.

“He had a lot of time. It was amazing. But I’m not surprised,” Sheahan said. “Just in the two days of his practice, you could see his skill set. The skill these kids have today, I’m not surprised.”

It wasn’t at the same end of the PNC Arena ice as Andrei Svechnikov’s lacrosse goal there against the Calgary Flames in 2019, although some of the clips on social media will look that way because of where the scoreboard cameras are compared to the television cameras.

Pashin’s homage to Svechnikov goal and jersey-tugging celebration offered a little bit of sizzle to make up for what the Hurricanes lacked in starpower during this first-ever rookie tournament in Raleigh, finishing with a 2-1-0 record after a 5-1 win over the Lightning.

The Hurricanes best prospects are still overseas or in college, and some players who would normally play a starring role in a tournament like this are either already above this level — Jack Drury, Pyotr Kotchektov — or were held out for precautionary reasons. Ryan Suzuki is still expected to fully participate in the Hurricanes’ NHL training camp when it opens later this week, but he would have been expected to dominate an event like this.

In their absence, Pashin’s goal Monday, Alexander Ponomarev’s consistency over the three games and Rees’ leadership emerged to fill the void. Rees, who played in Chicago the past two seasons, isn’t quite big enough at 5-foot-10 or skilled enough to be a top prospect, but he’s good enough and skates well enough that he’ll get his shot in the NHL, and he can certainly dominate a tournament like this.

After winning a fight Sunday despite giving up 9 inches to his opponent, he took an elbow to the chops Monday just before setting up one goal, fed Pashin for his lacrosse goal and, after the Lightning scored to make it 4-1 and threatened to get back in the game — the Hurricanes ended up winning in overtime after squandering a late two-goal lead Sunday against the Nashville Predators — Rees cut to the middle and scored his second goal of the day to put an end to any thoughts of another comeback.

“It’s good to have these couple games to step in and get back into it,” Rees said. “I think my first game was a little slow but I built off of it. Yesterday, too, I thought we played a really hard game, hard to play against. Pissed them off and it carried on into today.”

Rees and Ponomarev and Pashin will all stick around for the Hurricanes’ main camp, and so will Sheahan, who coached the Chicago Steel of the USHL junior league last season. He’s used to coaching teenagers, so this weekend wasn’t out of character, but he’s looking forward to watching Rod Brind’Amour and his staff as he embarks on his first season as a pro coach. He’s spoken with Jaccob Slavin, whose younger brother he coached in Chicago, but he’s going into it with his eyes open.

“Just being around the day-to-day operations, I think is going to be a great experience for me,” Sheahan said.

The uncertainties of this group of prospects served as a direct contrast to the main camp, which has very few mysteries, one of which already appears to be solved. Jake Gardiner, who missed all of last season after hip surgery, was expected to compete for a spot in training camp but the Hurricanes no longer expect the defenseman to join the team — opening the door for Gardiner to spend the final season of his contract on long-term injured reserve and solve their salary-cap issues.

That’s good news for former-and-perhaps-future Hurricanes defenseman Calvin de Haan, a tryout invite to training camp who’s now even more likely to earn a contract than he was before.

Those kinds of roster issues are foreign to most of the players who had been occupying the home dressing room this week, but they had to move their gear down the hall after Monday’s game to make room for the NHL gear being trucked over from the practice rink.

The veterans will take the ice for an unofficial, optional practice Tuesday. The kids’ moment is over for now, one goal left a lasting impression, at the least.

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