Welcome back to Top Shelf Prospects, the column that brings you the next crop of professional hockey players. Each day our LWOS Prospects Writers will bring you a new player profile or topical article in the lead-up to the 2023 NHL Draft. Be sure to bookmark the site, follow Ben Kerr, Kyle Pereira and Frederik Frandson on Twitter, and spread the word for the site that will bring you analytical and critical profiles and scouting reports! Last Word On Hockey Prospects is your new headquarters for everything “NHL Draft”! Today we bring you our Gabe Perreault Scouting Report.
Gabe Perreault Scouting Report
The 2023 NHL draft is getting closer and closer. The order has been mostly completed, and teams now know when to select their newest players. There are a few options for those teams outside the top ten looking to strengthen their offensive prospect pool. One of these is USNTDP forward, Gabe Perreault who finished a brilliant season.
On the international scene, Gabe Perreault was a key part of the gold medal-winning Team USA with 18 points in seven games. With the USNTDP Perreault scored 45 points in 23 USHL games and enjoyed the second highest ppg stat in the USHL. The only player ahead of him was his linemate Will Smith, who was a great partner to Perreault alongside Ryan Leonard. A line that was so good that Perreault almost has been overshadowed by Smith and Leonard.
Skating:
Gabe Perreault is an interesting player in the upcoming draft since his offensive side of the puck has an unbelievable amount of skill behind it. However, this skill is also quite raw and needs finetuning to succeed in the NHL. This includes his skating, where he is edges and agility on the ice is quite good, allowing him to get into some good positions on the ice for scoring chances. Something he especially benefits from with his direct style where he finds the open spaces on the ice.
However, at the same time, his skating is anything but refined. It’s not as powerful as it could be, and as a result, his speed suffers. His acceleration is one of the areas he has to improve, as he tends to take very inconsistent strides. This hurts his overall speed and ability to take advantage of his skating against NHL-caliber defensemen.
Offensive Qualities:
Gabe Perreault is a sensational talent. His skating is his only real weakness when it comes to his offensive game. His playmaking is great, and he has a tremendous vision. He sees the ice extremely well in the offensive zone and is often able to make a pass that split the defense apart. Even when he is under pressure Perreault doesn’t flinch. He has a great IQ and calmness with the puck and always seems to be able to sense where there is an open teammate.
His positional awareness is among the best in the draft class, and he will often find himself in the right place at the right time. He constantly seeks luck on the ice, to the point where it’s anything but just being lucky. He constantly knows where chances can happen and goes to those areas with brilliant movement. This means the pucks will often come to him, rather than him having to find the puck all the time. Something that tends to happen to great players.
Key Qualities In His Game
Combine this with a brilliant set of hands, and it’s not a mystery why he was one of the best offensive players in the USHL this season. His shot is intelligent as he often has the mind of a sniper, despite being seen as a playmaker. He often uses it on the rush, where he confidently takes on defenders with his skilled puck handling to get open for a quick and accurate wrist shot.
All the offensive qualities mentioned also mean he is a brilliant powerplay specialist. His vision on and off the puck always makes him a highly dangerous player on the man advantage. It’s not unlikely, given the importance of powerplays in modern hockey, that he could become a catalyst for powerplay success for the NHL team who takes him at the draft.
Defensive qualities:
Given Gabe Perreault’s role on the USNTDP, he wasn’t exactly the most noticeable player defensively for the team. He was often the last player back and would be tasked to cover the point. A job that often can make the player’s defensive abilities hard to judge. However, it’s hard to deny that Perreault often tends to be quite stationary when it comes to the defensive areas of the ice. His backchecking can be somewhat lazy, and it’s clear that he is an offensively-minded player.
As much as it is nice to have a great offensive mind like Perreault on the roster, it does feel like he has to get a more well-rounded game. He needs to become better at his backchecking and this is another area where improvements to his skating would help his game.
Perreault is also an undersized forward, who counteracts his lack of size with a lot of intelligence. He might not be the player who throws the body around or wins the battle along the board, but he positions himself really well during the forecheck and defensively take make a play. This does give him a good chance to learn to become a more well-rounded player during his upcoming tenure at Boston College.
Comparable and Prediction:
In many ways, Gabe Perreault stands out in the upcoming draft, as one of the more intriguing players. In terms of his skillset and raw talent offensively, he is among the best there is. He is an extremely smart playmaker, with a great shot and tons of creativity. Yet despite his clear talent he is only predicted to go in the late first round? The reason is his skating and size, which is below that of many prospects in the first round. This combined with the fact he played with some of the best prospects in the draft, Will Smith and Ryan Leonard, has some wondering if his season was a byproduct of playing with them.
Despite the concerns it would be shocking to have Perreault drop outside the first round, as he has all the tools to be a star in the NHL. Especially with his fantastic vision and awareness with and without the puck in the offensive zone. Overall Perreaults awareness and skillset are very similar to that of a player like Jake Guentzel, who also seems to be in the right place at the right time on most occasions.
Highlights
Main Photo: Eric Bolte-USA TODAY Sports
