The Maple Leafs have announced their development camp roster. Today’s activity is all off-ice, but tomorrow they’ll be on the ice at the MCC, and there will be a media availability, so when we have video we’ll post that. It’s often a lot of fun to hear the very young guys talk their game.
The Leafs invited 46 players to camp this time, with a lot their own draft picks on hand and a surprising eight of the nine players just drafted. Semyon Kizimov is the only one not there.
Maple Leafs Director of Player Development Scott Pellerin will oversee this year’s camp. Leafs assistant coaches Jim Hiller and D.J. Smith, as well as Toronto Marlies head coach Sheldon Keefe and Newfoundland Growlers head coach Ryane Clowe, will be on-ice working with the prospects, who will be split into two groups.
The full roster is below:
This camp marks the debut of Vladislav Kara, last year’s draft-day mystery, at a Leafs’ camp. Joining the Leafs draft picks are also the recently added Marlies players who first appeared on try outs:
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Also on hand are many invited players. One is the undrafted David Levin, an Israeli-born Canadian who has played in Canada for a long time, much like Semyon Der-Arguchintsev. He is playing on the Sudbury Wolves right now.
I note the Leafs found a player for St. John’s, Adam Holwell to invite too.
They also found another Latvian in addition to Martins Dzierkals. Rodrigo Abols had a very good showing at the World Championships this spring, and he might be one to watch.
It’s good to see Eemeli Räsänen over for this camp too. For him, Kara and other KHL or Russian players, the season starts sooner, so it can be difficult to work this sort of thing into the offseason.
Joseph Woll is here in net, along with newly drafted Zachary Bouthillier, but there’s no Ian Scott. That’s a good thing. No goalie needs extra work, and he’s been seen a lot at the Marlies practices.
The invitee goalies are a mystery: Tyriq Outen from Tampa and Darion Hanson from Minnesota.
What’s exciting about Leafs camp is that there are players from everywhere, representing every sort of system or coaching. This is going to be fun!
