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Huck24 · 09-15-2020, 02:25 PM

We are at the IIHF tournament, and we just sat down with the New Orleans Specters defender and alternate captain, Lyle Odelein III who is here at the tourney playing with his fellow Canadians. Lyle and the Canadians are looking at adding a second straight gold medal to their trophy cabinets. We caught up with Lyle to talk to him about a bunch of SHL topics, but mainly the SHL entry draft which just took place this past Saturday.

Before we get to that interview, let’s have a little closer look on how the S56 SHL entry draft went. This seasons draft was the biggest yet, with two new teams joining the SHL, the Atlanta Inferno and the Seattle Argonauts picked their first ever SMJHL prospects. An exciting time for the franchises and the draftees.

The first round of the draft saw only 11 of the 18 SHL make selections, with the remaining 7 teams to sit back and watch. Tampa Bay owned the most picks in the first with 4 selections in the first 17 picks. They added Aleksander Kozlov (first overall selection), Vladmir Petrov, KnockedOut ByOvechkin and Phillip Weaver. The Weaver pick at 17th overall would have been the New Orleans Specters first pick of the draft, but a previous trade with Tampa Bay saw them select their fourth player of the draft. The New England Wolfpack had three first rounders join them, selecting Calvin Hobbes, Grandmaster Funk and Teylora Petrove (the third Petrov selected in this seasons first round). The first selection by an expansion team can with the 15th overall pick, the Seattle Argonauts selected Dee Centerman IV and three picks later, they added their 2nd player, Zdenko Beranek.

The second round of the draft saw our New Orleans Specters select their first player of the S56 SHL entry draft, they selected forward Zbynek Dobrovsky of the St. Louis Scarecrows. Dobrovsky is a right winger who hails from the city of Jesenik in the Czech Republic. His rookie season with the St. Louis Scarecrows, Dobrovsky played in all 50 games, scoring 4 goals on 43 shots and adding 7 assists. The Czech winger also recorded 38 hits and 23 blocked shots while averaging 11:26 minutes of ice time, with 1.10 mins on the power play and 1 minute while shorthanded. The second round also saw the 2nd expansion team, the Atlanta Inferno, select their first ever player in the SHL entry draft, with the 22nd overall pick, they selected Michael Withecheck.

This pick was the 21st overall, the pick was originally owned by the Minnesota Chiefs, but the Specters owned from a previous trade with Minnesota. Their actual pick for the second round had also been traded, the Specters had traded it to the San Francisco Pride, who with the 35th overall pick selected Patrik Money.

The third round had the Specters making no picks, having also previously traded their pick to the San Francisco Pride, the pick was the 53rd overall and the Pride selected Raivo Helminen. The fourth round pick for the Specters had also been previously traded, this time to the Tampa Bay Barracuda who opted to pass on their selection.

The fifth round of the draft, saw the Specters pick their second and final player of the draft. With the 89th overall pick, they selected a player who has very, very close ties with the franchise, another St. Louis Scarecrow as well, Xavier Doom. Doom is a center from Reykjavik, Iceland, the Icelander scored 5 goals on 42 shots for the Crows and also had 9 assists to go along with that. Xavier had 61 hits and 46 blocked shots while logging 10.55 minutes of ice time per game, and seeing a decent amount of time while short handed (1.31 mins per game).

Now with this brief Specters draft recap done, let’s bring you our interview with the New Orleans Specters alternate captain, Lyle Odelein III:

Q. Hello Lyle, thank you very much for taking the time to talk with us.

A. Not a problem, my pleasure as always!

Q. I know you don’t have a ton of time since you are going to be putting the Team Canada jersey on soon to play for your country in the IIHF tourney.

A. That’s right, back with my fellow Canadians. Hoping we can repeat the magic that we had last tournament and be able to head back home with another gold medal around our necks. We’ve got the team to do it, we’ve just got to be on the top of our game.

Q. It should definitely be a fun tournament to watch. There’s some great teams this season, the fans will have a lot of great games to see. Now, the S56 entry draft, tell us how you felt your team, the New Orleans Specters did.

A. As always, I think the front office did an amazing job this season. We didn’t really have all that many picks due to previous trades, but we sure made to the best use of the ones we had!

Q. Do you know much about the two players that were drafted?

A. I do. Dobrovsky and Doom both play in St. Louis in the SMJHL, which is where I played my junior hockey. It’s a great place and they produce some of the best players around. I caught a few of the Scarecrows games last season, both of these guys really stood out to me. I’m actually quite surprised we were able to get Dobrovsky when we did. None of us thought he would be available when we picked at 21, but we got lucky! We always knew that Xavier would be a Specter, he’s got some really strong ties with the organization.

Q. Any other thoughts on this seasons draft?

A. Ya, it was an interesting draft. Seeing how many picks had been traded was wild. It was a long wait for a lot of teams before they got to make their first picks. Tampa Bay and New England owned this draft for the most part. It was cool seeing Atlanta and Seattle make their first picks ever too. I’ve never been around for league expansion, so it was interesting to see it all shake out.

Q. How do you feel the new teams did with their expansion drafts?

A. I think they both did a great job. Seattle was able to get one of the best defenders in the SHL with Carrius Darrow and they snagged Vanice from us, going to miss Thomas, he’s a great player and a great person. Seattle got a couple of good ones with these guys. Atlanta also has done a great job, they took DeMaricus Smyth from us. That one stung. DeMaricus was a huge role model for me when I came into the league. He has been and always will be a good friend. I was lucky enough to be his defensive partner for the majority of last season, I learned a lot from him and can’t thank him enough. But I get why Atlanta took him, you couldn’t have a better player to make sure the locker room starts off on the right foot with Smyth.

Q. We also saw some major free agent movement during this offseason, any thoughts on that?

A. Ya, it’s been a wild off season, that’s for sure. Losing Vanice and Smyth to expansion was rough, but then Boris and Cain opting to explore free agency and Bork Lazer signing an offer sheet. I wish them all luck with their next teams, Cain is another player that really helped me out when I first started, he is a great goalie and a great teammate, he hasn’t signed anywhere as far as I know, but whoever does get Cain a new contract, are going to be happy that they did.

Q. So you’ve got some empty slots to fill on the roster, any word on who will be coming in?

A. I’ve got no insider info to give right now! We’ve already brought in Steven Moyer who is an amazing player himself. He’s got a St. Louis connection as well so he is going to fit into the line up perfectly! We’ve also signed a back up, Sergei Potvinov, for our new starting goalie, Olli Saarinen. We’ve still got a couple of holes to fill, but I’ve got all the confidence in the world in our management team. They will make sure we have the best team possible on the ice to start the season.

Q. Any way too early season predictions?

A. Not at all! With the number of trades / signings happening this off season, I have no idea what teams are going to look like. I’ve never seen so much movement before, and some of these contracts are really up there. Some teams are really going all in, should be a very interesting season. I just know that we are going to be coming back strong. It was a great run for us last season, but it was a heart breaker of an end.

Q. I’m sure you are referring to New Orleans game seven overtime loss to Buffalo in the Challenge Cup finals.

A. Yup, that’s the one. I’m not going to be forgetting that one any time soon. We were so close, it could have went either way. But that’s the game we play. We are going to do everything we can to get back to the finals this season, and hopefully we will have a slightly better outcome at the end of it.

Q. Well, that’s all the time we’ve got Lyle, really appreciate this. Best of luck with Team Canada in the tournament and the same for your Specters. Looking forward to seeing how the season goes for you.

A. It should be a good one for us, really looking forward to hitting the ice with the Specters again, new and old!
Well, that about wraps it up, thanks for reading and good luck to everyone on the upcoming seasons and congratulations to all of the S56 draftees! Lyle is looking forward to seeing you all in the SHL when you make to move!

Word count - 1736 - 2x draft media

Nictox · 09-15-2020, 03:01 PM

Good read! I'm ready to get back on the ice with you!

RIP Dangel #AD26 | RIP TDZ

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