Mystery, opportunity abound as Hurricanes host NHL prospect tournament for first time
Not even his teammates knew who Keith Aucoin was when he showed up in Kitchener, Ontario, in September of 2001, an almost anonymous addition to the Carolina Hurricanes’ prospects in a preseason tournament.
He was an undersized forward from a program with a profile as slight as his stature, Norwich University, a Division III military school in Vermont. But Tom Rowe, the general manager of the Hurricanes’ AHL affiliate in Lowell, Mass., liked Aucoin’s skill level and signed him to a minor-league deal. The Hurricanes added him as a warm body to fill out their tournament roster.
In retrospect, there wasn’t a ton of skill on the ice that week. Mike Zigomanis, the Hurricanes’ second-round draft pick that June, was their biggest star. Most of the names on the roster – Shaun Fisher, Peter Reynolds, Sean Curry, (not that) Ryan Murphy – sound like they were auto-generated by a video game. Their first-round pick, Russian defenseman Igor Knyazev, currently residing in the where-are-they-now file, wasn’t joining the team until the next week in Florida.
There were a few decent players on the ice for the Toronto Maple Leafs, Boston Bruins and New York Rangers, but more busts than stars.
But against scores of players NHL teams had deemed draftable, the undrafted player dominated. In the space of three games, Aucoin went from the Hurricanes’ third line to centering their first line, leading the tournament in scoring and launching an unlikely pro career. Even that performance didn’t end up earning him an invite to training camp, but he’d end up playing more NHL games (145) than anyone on that prospect team but Zigomanis (197). Tomas Kurka and Brett Lysak, both second-round picks, combined to play 19. Goalie Rob Zepp played 10.
That’s the magic of that kind of tournament, creating those rare moments when the doorway to opportunity swings open and a player no one’s ever heard of storms through it. And for the first time, that could happen here.
It would have been unthinkable in 2001 that such an event could ever be held here, but two decades later – after trips to Kitchener and Kanata, Ontario, and Ottawa and Traverse City, Mich., and Nashville and Tampa – the Hurricanes will serve as hosts for the first time this weekend at Wake Competition Center and PNC Arena.
It’s a remarkable event, full of hope and promise and potential, even if very little of that pans out in the end. For a few days, for everyone on the ice and everyone watching, anything seems possible.
There isn’t always an Aucoin or a Chad LaRose (Kanata, 2003) who jump-starts a career. Sometimes, it’s one of the last acid tests to see if a first-round pick is ready for the NHL, a training-camp warm-up for Eric Staal (Ottawa, 2003) or Andrew Ladd (Ottawa, 2005) or Andrei Svechnikov (Traverse City, 2018). No one expected that from Seth Jarvis last year, but he started forcing the issue in Tampa and never stopped.
Even with 2019 first-round pick Nick Suzuki, making his third tournament appearance, there aren’t those kinds of immediate future stars on this year’s roster, which may leave an opening for someone to surprise, like big Russian defenseman Grigori Dronov, a 24-year-old unsigned invitee.
But that’s the mystery of it. Especially without an obvious future star, there’s a chance here for a mid-level prospect to emerge as dominant among his peers, or for someone who’s just a name on the roster to steal the show. This is the kind of year someone can do what Aucoin did in 2001, and for the first time they’ll get to do it right here.
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