Flames’ playoff stakes too high to play Parekh just yet
Unless there is an injury, or one of the team’s final games is deemed meaningless in the standings, the organization’s most exciting prospect won’t suit up for his first NHL game until the fall.
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One sleep after joining the Calgary Flames in Anaheim, Zayne Parekh was asked the question on everybody’s mind:
Are you ready to play pro hockey?
“Um, you never know,” said the uber-confident 19-year-old with rare hesitation.
“I think I’ve got to feel it out, especially next fall or summertime and see what happens.
“But I’m confident in my ability. If I had the opportunity, I’d be able to play in an NHL game. But I guess we’ll see what happens here.”
Spoiler alert: The plan is for him to simply watch and learn these last five games.
Unless there is an injury, or one of the team’s final games is deemed meaningless in the standings, the organization’s most exciting prospect won’t suit up for his first NHL game until the fall.
Nor should he.
As dominant as he’s been as one of the most prolific defencemen in junior hockey history, the stakes are simply too high for a youngster to step into a situation like this.
Four points behind Minnesota with five games to go, there is no margin for error for the big club, and no need to disrupt the chemistry of a squad that is playing its best hockey of the season when it matters most.
It might not be a popular take, given how exciting a prospect he is.
But it’s the right one.
“We’re not afraid to put him in if we had an injury, but we want to be able to put him in a position to succeed, like we did with Dustin (Wolf),” said general manager Craig Conroy Tuesday.
“I get the hype, and how excited fans are to see him because, let’s be honest, when you’re comparing what he did in junior hockey, we’re talking about Bobby Orr.
“But we have a great group of guys who are doing something special, and we have to stick with that.”
Let’s be clear: if the Flames were comfortably in a playoff position, Parekh and Suniev would suit up like so many other junior and collegiate additions around the league.
Ditto if the team’s playoff dreams were dead.
But the Flames’ situation is unique, and denying Parekh a chance to play now won’t do anything to hurt his future stardom.
There’s tremendous merit in having Parekh and Aydar Suniev join the team, meet everyone, skate with the squad, see how things work, experience the travel and watch how their future peers prepare for playoff-like games.
The kids see value in it, too, and will be drinking out of a fire hose when it comes to preparing for next fall.
Long term, this will serve them well.
Parekh’s situation is different from Cale Makar’s playoff debut in Colorado in 2019, when Makar was 21 (two years older) and had already played two years against collegiate men.
Parekh has been a man amongst boys in Saginaw, where he joined Orr as the only defender in OHL/OHA lore to post consecutive 30-goal seasons.
The six-foot, 185-pound skating whiz is special alright, and quite likely to be an NHL star once he assimilates.
But that doesn’t mean there aren’t more growing pains ahead.
Parekh was the first to admit his training camp experience with the Flames as an 18-year-old was “humbling.”
His welcome-to-the-bigs moment came during his prospect tourney debut when he was stripped of the puck for the opposition’s overtime winner.
Protecting against that happening in Game 77 of an NHL playoff race just makes sense.
“I took away a lot, including just how hard it is to be there, and how much strength I had to put on,” said Parekh, chuckling over how much of an eye-opener it was to play one of his two exhibition games against Quinn Hughes and Elias Pettersson.
“To be honest, I wasn’t in the gym enough the last two years during the season. This year I was in the gym at least two or three times a week. I learned a lot.”
Conroy says he thinks his ninth overall pick from last summer looks thicker, and maybe even taller.
Playing 35 minutes a night in the series that saw his defending national champions bow out in the first round, he’s undoubtedly a better defender and would be much better prepared to prove himself in the bigs now.
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But forcing the issue is unnecessary, especially since the team is unlikely to have more than one practice between now and the season’s end to get him up to speed on their defensive structure.
“I’d be grateful to get in, but it’s completely okay with me whether I play or not,” said Parekh, who will participate in all team skates, meals and meetings.
“If I don’t, it’s probably because they’re making the playoffs, and that’s even better. I’ll be their No. 1 supporter, and selfishly, I want to see what the city looks like come playoff time because I’ve seen a lot of clips of that last playoff run they had.”
Safe to say, the city is more interested in seeing him.
“I’m really similar to what I was last year, but I’ve added a lot to my game, especially on the other side of the puck,” said the lad who led all OHL defenders with 33 goals, 107 points and a plus-42 rating in 61 games.
“My angles and gaps are a lot better. Around the net, I’ve got to continue to add some strength, but with the puck, I think I’ve taken it to another level.”
Everyone in and around the organization and city is dying to see it.
All of it.
But if they care about what’s best for him and the team right now, they’ll understand why it makes far more sense for him to wait until next fall to demonstrate how far he’s come.
