Golden Age for Arizona Hockey?

[Kobe Armstrong]

For all the flak Arizona gets for being a poor hockey market, the state sure has turned out a disproportionate amount of NHL prospects over the past decade. While a lot of the best Arizona-born players are simply children of former NHL players who played in Phoenix, there are also a number of players and prospects who came up through the Arizona junior hockey system.

Overall I would argue that hockey in Arizona has become more viable than hockey in the Carolinas, Texas, or Atlanta (duh..) Now with the Sharks playing in Arizona for the start of the season and Arizona State having a great D1 program, I think we are just witnessing the start of the Arizona hockey boom.

Notable NHL Players:
Auston Matthews
Sean Couturier (son of former player)
Matt Tkachuk (son)
Tage Thompson (son)

Notable Drafted Players:
Jesse Ylonen (2nd rounder, son)
Todd Burgess (4th rounder)
Demetrios Koumontzis (4th rounder)
Mark Kastelic (5th rounder, son)

Notable Prospects:
Red Savage (2021 draft, son)
Matthew Knies (2021 draft)
Josh Doan (undrafted 2020 but is having a nice season, son)
Erik Middendorf (undrafted 2018 but is killing the USHL)

I'm sure I'm missing some but I think this is an impressive list for a South Western state.

Click to read more...

 

[DudeWhereIsMakar]

I have a gut feeling Vegas will have a whole bunch in 15-20 years.

 

[Mickey Marner]

They could be like St. Louis in 20 years, with Keller, the Tkachuks, Maroon, Mayfield etc.

 

[Primary Assist]

Having strong programs like University of Arizona, Northern Arizona University, and of course Arizona State must incentivize a lot of parents into putting their young kids into hockey. This might be a chicken or the egg type thing with those players creating the strong programs, but it's great to see the game grow in a non-traditional market.

 

[gr8haluschak]

I would suggest you are overvaluing some of contributions, Tkachuk would have been 3 or 4 when his dad was traded to St Louis and spent the majority of his minor hockey with the Blues AAA minor program. Similarly, I would say the same thing about Sean Couturier, he played most of his minor hockey in New Brunswick.

 

[Zenos]

I would suggest you are overvaluing some of contributions... I would say the same thing about Sean Couturier, he played most of his minor hockey in New Brunswick.

I was ready to post essentially the same thing. Couts was born in AZ (to parents from Quebec), but moved already to Milwaukee a year later. His first organized hockey was played in Germany (dad Sylvain played for Düsseldorf in the DEL), and he was in Canada (Bathurst, NB) by the time he was 9 years old. Needless to say, the connection to Phoenix is tenuous at best.

Nevertheless, it’s great to see some more Arizona native sons flourish. I hope we continue to see the area produce another couple Auston Mathews over the years.

 

[BOS358]

I was ready to post essentially the same thing. Couts was born in AZ (to parents from Quebec), but moved already to Milwaukee a year later. His first organized hockey was played in Germany (dad Sylvain played for Düsseldorf in the DEL), and he was in Canada (Bathurst, NB) by the time he was 9 years old. Needless to say, the connection to Phoenix is tenuous at best.

Not only that, he plays for Canada in international competition. Clearly, his heart is Canadian.

Technically speaking, you could say that Auston Matthews is actually a Californian, as his family moved to Arizona when he was young. I'd say he has far more connection to AZ than Couturier or Tkachuk. The thing that, to me, makes Matthew special is that he was not the son of an NHL player who happened to be playing for the Coyotes at the time, but actually grew up there and played youth hockey for the local clubs.

Regardless, there have been some pretty decent players not named Auston Matthews who have played for his old club. They're not exactly Compuware or Honeybaked, but they're a lot better than one would think.

 

[Summer Rose]

It’s interesting to see considering how much of a joke the Coyotes have been for most of our existence in Arizona. Back when I picked up playing hockey in 2002, there were only five rinks in the Phoenix area (four of them had dual sheets so there were seven total), one in Tucson, and one in Flagstaff. Since then, they built another dual sheet rink, one added a third, and just this year a seventh rink opened up (not sure how many ice sheets it has since I don’t live there anymore). Arizona State has also started building an arena for their hockey team and the development will include an eighth rink. Furthermore, while the Arizona Sundogs folded, Prescott now has a rink thanks to them.

Maybe some day this will translate to the Coyotes not being an armpit of a franchise. I can only hope.

 

[BOS358]

Maybe some day this will translate to the Coyotes not being an armpit of a franchise. I can only hope.

I'd say it's more likely that the Coyotes, who will likely continue to be run by a group of incompetent donkeys, will entertain the home fans by getting lit up by local boys playing for other teams.

 

[Kobe Armstrong]

I would suggest you are overvaluing some of contributions, Tkachuk would have been 3 or 4 when his dad was traded to St Louis and spent the majority of his minor hockey with the Blues AAA minor program. Similarly, I would say the same thing about Sean Couturier, he played most of his minor hockey in New Brunswick.

Oh yeah I'm aware that a lot of these players didn't play their junior hockey in Arizona or live in the state very long. However, there are some kids of NHL players that played all their Junior hockey in Arizona. Brian Savage's kids all played in Arizona and they're turning out pretty well. Shane Doan's son played in Arizona as well, I have a feeling the Coyotes take him in the 6th or 7th round this year. Kastelic as well who has been a good surprise for Arizona.

What is encouraging to see is that the Coyotes moved to Arizona in 1996, and now we're getting to the point in time where the kids who grew up with hockey in Arizona are finally turning into adults and now we are seeing more viable NHL talent come out of the south west than ever before.

I was ready to post essentially the same thing. Couts was born in AZ (to parents from Quebec), but moved already to Milwaukee a year later. His first organized hockey was played in Germany (dad Sylvain played for Düsseldorf in the DEL), and he was in Canada (Bathurst, NB) by the time he was 9 years old. Needless to say, the connection to Phoenix is tenuous at best.

Nevertheless, it’s great to see some more Arizona native sons flourish. I hope we continue to see the area produce another couple Auston Mathews over the years.

It helps that the Phoenix Jr Coyotes of the T1EHL are a legit junior/midget program now. Alumni from that team have been moving to good programs in the USHL and NCAA pretty regularly.

My main point is that even though the Coyotes suck, Arizona seems to be turning out more hockey players than Tennessee, North Carolina, and other non-traditional hockey states. Maybe these states will catch up in a few years, maybe not. Either way I'm happy that the hockey in Arizona experiment hasn't been a total failure.

Without the Coyotes there would be no Auston Matthews

 

[jetsforever]

I was ready to post essentially the same thing. Couts was born in AZ (to parents from Quebec), but moved already to Milwaukee a year later. His first organized hockey was played in Germany (dad Sylvain played for Düsseldorf in the DEL), and he was in Canada (Bathurst, NB) by the time he was 9 years old. Needless to say, the connection to Phoenix is tenuous at best.

Nevertheless, it’s great to see some more Arizona native sons flourish. I hope we continue to see the area produce another couple Auston Mathews over the years.

Yep, I was going to say the same. Just being born there is interesting but doesn't have too much connection to the state. Matthews on the other hand was born elsewhere but spent many of his formative years in Arizona.

 

[Voight]

Matthews is really the only local product.

Even Thompson played across the USA as a kid.

 

[LeafChief]

ASU has done an incredible job of becoming a solid D1 school in the NCAA in a short amount of time. I believe they're in the process of building a new stadium for the team as well.

 

[Kobe Armstrong]

Matthews, Knies, Doan

How many US states have produced a better group of players in the past 10 years?