The bulk of the Vancouver Canucks’ junior-bound prospects were reassigned before the pre-season stage of training camp, with only two exceptions: Sawyer Mynio and Vilmer Alriksson.
While Alriksson has already enjoyed his first taste of exhibition action, making an impression with a spirited tilt against a nine-year NHL veteran, Mynio made his pre-season debut on Friday night in Seattle.
Perhaps Mynio felt comfortable playing in his “home team” crowd as a Seattle Thunderbird. Whatever the reason, he played a sound game on a mixed corps of NHL veterans and young defenders.
Paired with Filip Hronek on the team’s top defensive unit, Mynio logged 19:32 of ice time, the third-highest among the Canucks’ defencemen.
His performance, along with Kirill Kudryavtsev and Christian Felton, caught the attention of 34-year-old defender Tyler Myers, who was impressed with the poise and composure of all three young defenders.
“I thought our young D men played really well tonight. They played hard and were making some good plays on breakouts. They should be proud of how they played,” said Myers.
Receiving praise from a veteran like Myers is a great honour, but what did the head coach think? For the second time in a week, Rick Tocchet provided a glowing review, specifically mentioning Mynio’s name.
“ [Mynio] is a great prospect for us. He’s poised out there,” Tocchet said.
Earlier in training camp, Tocchet highlighted Mynio as a standout prospect, so doubling down is always an encouraging testimony for a budding youngster.
Despite the praise, Mynio is bound for his fourth, and potentially final, season in junior hockey, where he’s expected to take on an even more significant role after a breakout year that saw him notch 16 goals and 53 points. As the primary defender, he’s expected to play heavy minutes in all situations for the Thunderbirds. Though the T-birds are in a rebuilding phase now, they have a solid recent history, winning a championship in 2022-23, a team Mynio was part of. With his mix of aggression, skating ability, powerful release, and winning pedigree, Mynio is shaping up to be a sturdy third-round selection for this management group.
Unless reassigned, Mynio’s next, and potentially last, opportunity to showcase himself will be on Saturday night as the Canucks visit the Calgary Flames for game four of their pre-season slate. The Thunderbirds play just down the road tonight, so it would make sense for the Canucks to reassign Mynio to his junior club today.
UPDATE: The Canucks assigned Mynio to his junior club on Saturday morning.
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