Despite the Hamilton Bulldogs besting a strong Rochester Americans squad in their season opener by a 6-4 final, there were some surprises on the scoresheet. Expected to lead the team in scoring this season, Sven Andrighetto was held pointless. A standout at Montreal Canadiens training camp, Christian Thomas was also blanked. Greg Pateryn, whose 15 goals ranked second among all AHL blueliners last year, wasn’t among the six different players to find the back of the night in the team’s first game.
Leading the way instead was a pair of Bulldog rookies who had shone brightly on half-baked Hamilton preseason rosters and then carried chemistry and productivity into their first professional hockey seasons. Despite the two taking very different paths to get here, coach Sylvain Lefebvre has found lightning in a bottle by uniting 20-year old Charles Hudon and 22-year old Daniel Carr on a scoring line.
Hudon joined the ‘Dogs as one of the more ballyhooed debutants. His under-average size caused him to plummet to the fifth round of the 2012 draft (despite having been roughly a point-per-game or better the two seasons prior), at which point the Canadiens decided they couldn’t risk having a homegrown offensive talent slip through their fingers, making him the 122nd overall selection. He increased his output in each of his remaining QMJHL seasons, scoring 76 points in 57 games (and another 21 in 22 playoff contests) in his final year of junior action, while adding a goal and three points during a brief 9-game PTO in Hamilton in 2013 along the way. His exploits were recognized with a selection to Canada’s World Junior Championship team last December, after having to withdraw from the event due to an injury the year prior.
The Alma, Quebec native has overcome his height deficiencies through his shiftiness, speed, and hard-working two-way game. Still, it remained a question to be answered as he moves on to a new level of bigger, stronger, and tougher competition, though (very) early indicators point to an easy adjustment. Rather than size, then, staying healthy has been highlighted as the new red flag in the youngster’s case file. Hudon has missed chunks of time with various ailments the past few seasons, the most concerning being reoccurring back pains of which he is unlikely to ever entirely rid himself. If he can play a near full-calendar in Hamilton this season, it’ll go a long way to put some of the durability fears to bed.
Carr, born in Leduc, Alberta, flew so far under the radar that he was never drafted after spending his 18-year old season split between the AJHL (where he played with his brother) and the BCHL (where he led his team in points-per-game in a smallish sample size, and then ranked third in playoff scoring, leading the league in post-season goals). It was when Carr made the jump to Union College that teams began to notice him, as he notched 107 points over 121 games in his first three NCAA seasons. Despite the attention – which included attending prospect camps with the Boston Bruins and Chicago Blackhawks – Carr returned to Union for his senior year, now as the club’s go-to offensive leader with 50 points in 39 games. Boasting strong skating ability, quick hands, and adequate size, at season’s end he says 6 or 7 NHL teams came calling, but he finally settled on a coveted entry-level deal with the Habs.
Unlike Hudon, Carr made his AHL debut without much fanfare. While a rookie, it’s important to consider that he has more experience than many of his younger teammates when assessing his progress and career projections. As a 1991 birthdate, he’s 6 months older than a Christian Thomas, or about 16 months senior to Sven Andrighetto. Still, he has been turning heads and has all the makings of a sleeper / late-bloomer, starring in AHL exhibition action with two goals and an assist in three games that included first star and third star nominations. He did so on a line with Hudon (a goal and an assist, also with a first star billing) and Tim Bozon, though the latter’s fate had him return to the WHL to continue to rebuild strength after a courageous battle with and recovery from meningitis.
With Bozon off the roster, the regular season opener saw the duo centered by Jacob De La Rose, another rookie who was the final cut from Montreal’s 23-man roster. The 19-year old Swede will be one of the AHL’s youngest skaters this year, but his experience playing in the middle allowed Hudon – who was being tried at centre as an experiment – to return to his more-comfortable wing alignment. Some might see combining three first year players as a risky move, but Lefebvre had seen enough to at least give them a shot, and it paid immediate dividends. A Hudon goal in the second period (with Carr assisting) drew the ‘Dogs even at 3, and as an acknowledgement of their strong play, Lefebvre gave them a more offensive center in Andrighetto to play with to finish the game. With just under 2:30 to go in the third, and only 17 seconds after captain Gabriel Dumont had tied the game at four, Carr tallied the game-winner on a Hudon centering feed https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wt1d4lr1fUY . Talk about a dramatic way to score your first professional goal, while seemingly all too familiar for the fast friends, with Carr taking first star honours and Hudon third, sandwiching former Bulldog Akim Aliu’s two-goal effort for the home Americans.
Without wanting to diminish Carr’s accomplishments to date, the name Aliu is an important one to keep in mind. A year ago, Aliu had been the darling of Bulldog camp, flashing the combination of strength and skill that seems to make at least one team a year want to take a shot at providing him an environment in which he might finally thrive. Aliu’s performance earned him a PTO, and he played the hero in the team’s second game of the season, salvaging a point in a shootout loss by scoring the game-tying marker with just 11 seconds to play. The 6’3” winger’s performances fizzled out, however, just as they with other organizations in the past, as he would go on to score just 3 more points in 14 total games with Hamilton before being released from his tryout.
This isn’t intended to compare the styles of Carr – a college grad who has a well-rounded game and has shown continual improvement – and Aliu – a tremendously naturally gifted athlete who never lived up to being selected in the second round of the 2007 draft by Chicago and who seems to require careful guidance and coaching in order to deliver consistent efforts. But as the old adage states, it’s really hard to get to the game’s highest levels, and even harder to stay there. For Carr, who hasn’t played more than 41 games in a regular season for a single team since 2008-09, the 76-game AHL schedule will be a test of both endurance and sustained motivation.
As the Bulldogs prepare for their home opener this Friday against their rival Toronto Marlies, Hudon and Carr have taken their destinies into their own hands. Fellow rookies Jack Nevins and Connor Crisp near returns from injuries, leaving Hamilton with the good problem of significant depth at forward. As first year players, producing right from the outset will help them stay in the line-up, though the coaching staff will face tough decisions given any other possible weak links – namely Nick Sorkin and Maxime Macenauer – also scored in the game.
There are sure to be ups and downs along the road, but both Hudon and Carr have upside to project as top 9 NHL forwards. Both have the ability to put points on the board, but also don’t take shortcuts, skating well and working hard in all three zones. They’re expected to flank Andrighetto again against Toronto on a line of smallish, quick, skilled forwards, while their former center De La Rose joins a bigger bodied group with veterans Drayson Bowman and Eric Tangradi. This year’s Bulldogs team evidently far deeper, but also much more talented, than last year’s edition, and it’s not unreasonable to predict that added to the experience these young players are gaining will be a post-season berth.