COOKING WITH STU

Stu MacGregor and his Oiler scouts have been rolling across prairie roads all winter long in search of the next Jordan Eberle. Or maybe the next Grant Fuhr.

In an interview published today by the Edmonton Sun, Terry Jones spoke to the Oilers scouting director about the 2014 draft. It’s an interesting read, but I wanted to extrapolate on one area:

The Oilers have a plethora of defensemen, but lack forwards on their prospect list. One of the reasons of course is the three recent graduates from the top of the 2010, 2011 and 2012 entry drafts. Among goalies, Edmonton boasts the recently acquired Laurent Brossoit and little else.

AHL GOALIES (OKC)

LaBarbera and Roy are gone, and Rimmer (who owns the best SP among the prospects in a very small sample size) didn’t cost them a damn thing. Bachman is having a nice season in Oklahoma and remains legend for his Edmonton performance — perhaps we’ll see him again. Tyler Bunz has a reasonable SP but we rarely hear the organization speak of him. Pickard is also in photo.

Bob McKenzie’s  list has Boston College goalie Thatcher Demko ranked #1 among goalies (and projects him to go early in the second round in June). Also listed in the top 50 are Plymouth’s Alex Nedeljkovic and Swede Jonas Johansson.

To my eye, the best goalie available might end up being Ville Husso  of Finland.  Hockey’s Future questions his mental game but that save-percentage in SM-Liiga tells me he’s pretty tough.

Witt and Summerhays are both in their final year of college eligibility, the other three (asterisk) can go back to college for another season.

If you’re a really good goalie, and know Edmonton scouts are in the building, do something to get noticed. It’ll be worth the effort.