Agreed about the defense, the kids have been impressive. I will again disagree with you on Rippon/Okhotiuk, they are both top pairing caliber in the O from a defensive shutdown point of view and don't dismiss the importance of their physicality come playoff time. One thing that imo did hurt us against Guelph is that Rippon was not100% which curbed his physicality which we needed against the big Guelph forwards. As for Harley I'm starting to agree with you, he would be quite an addas long as Clarke returns otherwise a top 6 forward is a priority. As you said before maybe we can get by with two lethal lines with added offense from the back end.
There are a few things I like about Harley:
1> It gives us an added dimension from the back end.
2> His relative cost will be similar to that of guys like Thomas (plus maybe two added 2nds conditional on his return next year)
3> If he does return (he’s only 18), we can dish him off at the deadline for a moderately similar return as what we paid.
4> He has swagger. He is a confident kid. HE is poised and is a force. HE looks for opportunities without giving much up from his defensive responsibilities.
5> He’d probably play with Bahl. That would drop Hoefenmayer down to the 2nd unit. It would mean Hoef’s pairing would be lined up with Quinn and Hoelscher’s line 5 on 5. That added boost would give the opposition fits. Not many teams would be able to cover two five man units successfully, especially with our speed.
6> Guaranteed, if we don’t deal for him, he’ll be playing against us in the playoffs for another contender. In my mind, he’d be a bigger factor to play against than any of the forwards available.
Those two defence units would easily play 50 minutes per game leaving the 3rd pairing with just 10 minutes of coverage against the oppositions 3rd and 4th lines. We can even rotate Rippon and Okhotyuk in with Hoef to help balance that load and distribute minutes. We could almost run with 5 D-Men to be honest.