Jett Luchanko gets a taste of the AHL

[Philadelphia Flyers]

Jett Luchanko gets a taste of the AHL

With the excitement still buzzing of adding a potentially high-end center into the organizational mix — after the Flyers acquired Trevor Zegras from the Ducks, of course — there seems no better time than now to circle back on this season’s professional tenure of another highly touted center in the system.

Jett Luchanko had himself, if nothing else, an eventful season. After beginning the season with the Flyers on a tryout basis, and showing some flashes of promise but also some moments of looking a little out of his depth, the decision was made to send him back to Guelph of the OHL. And here he managed to get himself going on a real tear, on a team that wasn’t going anywhere — Guelph struggled to string together wins and by the end of the season, they found themselves comfortably out of the playoff picture. But this opened the door for Luchanko to make another step up in his development, giving him the opportunity to join the Phantoms for the end of their regular season, as well as their eventual playoff run. It was another serious ramping up of the level of competition, but Luchanko did well to acclimate as he got more games under his belt, and found a way to end this somewhat strange season on a high note.

Games played	Goals	Assists	Points	PIM	Shots on goal	Shooting percentage
9	0	3	3	8	7	0

Luchanko got in for a tidy nine games at the end of the regular season for the Phantoms, enough to get his feet wet and give him an introduction to the league before things ramped up again getting into the postseason. And while he got off to a bit of a hot start with them — his first game was a little scattered, but he rebounded nicely and put up a point in each of his next two games to close out the road trip — things cooled off pretty significantly for the final six games, seemingly after some of the adrenaline wore off. Across those final six games of the regular season, Luchanko was held without a point for five games in a row (until he collected one more assist in the season finale in Hershey) and he put up just one shot on goal across that same span, to boot, as he worked through some difficult matchups and tighter and more physical defensive coverage than he would have grown used to.

Games Played	Goals	Assists	Points	PIM	Shots on goal	Shooting percentage
7	0	6	6	12	10	0

The playoff performance for Luchanko, then, was something of a mixed bag. There were a lot of positives at work, even overwhelmingly, to be sure, and the full display of his playmaking prowess was one of the most notable.

The thing that stands out here, of course, is the persistent lack of goals. Now, it’s not as though Luchanko was completely without his share of chances — and we’ll certainly give him credit for increasing his shooting volume to a degree as he hit the postseason — but he still, on the whole, wasn’t showing up as a major shooting threat for the Phantoms. And while the Phantoms definitely had a host of issues working against them in the postseason and Luchanko’s play was not close to the top of that last, the fact that he was so rarely making himself a shooting option did make him easier to defend (something we saw in a big way as the series against Hershey went on, and they got more of a sense of him as a player).

Three Questions​

Did he live up to expectations?

While it might have been easy to assume that a player who had already begun to carve out a role for himself in the NHL, even in just a nine-game tryout, at the beginning of the season would be able to jump into the AHL and immediately start tearing it up, it felt important coming into Luchanko’s stint with the Phantoms to remember that, in spite of all of the hype and potential Luchanko was bringing in with him, he was still an 18 year old debuting in the AHL, and that’s a steep jump to make.

Those who expected a taking off and running in that AHL stint might have been a little disappointed, but he just about reached the threshold of expectation for the more tempered crowd. That is, Luchanko didn’t bring in heaps of points, but he still did have a positive impact — his playmaking was showing well, and his speed gave the Phantoms a much needed boost down the middle during the most important part of the season. The jump up to that level is a big one, but Luchanko got some valuable development time in at that level, and some important notes and experience to take with him into his summer of training, and his next season (wherever he might find himself for it). The growing pains were evident at times, but Luchanko’s dynamic game was a welcome breath of fresh air in the mix for that Phantoms team that was short on game-breakers on their roster. The execution wasn’t always there for him, but it was clear that he was trying things, figuring out in real time what works at that level and what doesn’t, and largely stood out in a positive way, which isn’t easy to do as an 18 year old in that league.

What would we like to see him improve on next season?

The hope is that the Phantoms might see Luchanko again down the stretch if they’re looking to make a long playoff run, and the more matured player will have a chance to showcase some of what he’s tinkered with in his game in his absence. One of the bigger areas they’ll want to see is that he’s a little more prepared for the pace of play at that level broadly, which is something that will help him remain a little more disciplined and avoid taking so many ill-timed penalties as he did last postseason. That will come with time and reps, but he already has a good enough foundation in place to build up from.

But the largest area in need of improvement is that shooting mentality. There’s no doubt about the strength of his playmaking ability, but his lines will continue to be easy to defend and the offense will be slow to come for him if he remains overly deferential and reticent to shoot the puck. If there’s another season of junior hockey in store for him, that will be a good place for him to get more repetitions in, to help the shooting become a little more instinctual, in a setting where he isn’t challenged as much by the defenses coming at him. It’s going to be a process, but getting it started at that lower level before ramping up in the pros should make things a little easier on him. He’ll need to tinker with the shot a bit more as well — adding a bit more power and continuing to work on accuracy — to improve his scoring game, but getting more comfortable with shooting more goes hand in hand with the rest of that work.

What can we expect from him next season?

It remains something of an open question where Luchanko will be spending his next season, whether the Flyers will opt to take the extra patient approach with him and send him back the OHL for one final season, of if they’ll decide that they want to take his development more directly into their own hands and decide that the things he needs to work on, he can do with them in the NHL, but one thing is for certain — we will not be seeing much, if any, of him with the Phantoms next season. There’s a possibility that he could come back in the same way as last year, as a reinforcement for the playoffs (and this would certainly give the team a meaningful boost of speed down the middle), but because of his age, he won’t be eligible to start the season with the Phantoms for another year. So, whichever way it shakes out, he’ll continue to work on his development largely outside of this league.

Source

Source: https://www.broadstreethockey.com/post/jett-luchanko-gets-a-taste-of-the-ahl/