Matvei Michkov Unveiled; Jett Luchanko Tested

The official debut of Matvei Michkov to the Flyers public occurred today. The Russian prodigy came in riding a wave of hype and anticipation without precedent in recent Flyers history, knowing that the organization has sought to put a lid on the energy as much as possible. They’re trying to prevent a boiling-over of excitement that leads to disappointment.

They’re trying to avoid saddling Michkov with more than he can handle. It’s a noble venture, but it’s equally pointless.

Matvei Michkov thrives in the limelight. He doesn’t want to ignore the fanfare. He’s excited by it. He’s fueled by it.

He was asked about the plethora of Michkov jerseys in the crowd to greet him as he took the ice for rookie camp, and he didn’t demure from showing just how much it thrilled him.

He didn’t need the translator to know what was being asked of him. Just the mention of his jersey number and the context clues surrounding it was enough to tip him off. Though, the truth is that he’s already beginning to require a translator less and less. Michkov describes it as his “English improving every day,” and it’s hard to disagree with him.

He’s already beginning to answer questions in English, and this wasn’t the first occasion in which he either commented or answered in the tongue he’s rapidly learning.

“Hard question,” he said when he was asked about his competitive nature being transparent even in a setting so informal as a rookie camp practice.

Anyone who had any understanding of Matvei Michkov at all would understand that it wouldn’t take him long to learn English. He would want to learn it as soon as possible because he doesn’t just want to be a great hockey player–though this takes absolute priority–he wants to be a superstar.

And that means speaking the language of the NHL.

Charlie’s quote will almost surely be prescient. It may not be literally true, though. After all, it’d be an extremely high bar for Michkov to clear if he was attacking English lessons with the same ferocity he does hockey drills.

On the first day of rookie camp, a six-and-a-half-foot-tall defenseman had the gall to interrupt Michkov’s path through the slot. Neither the size of the offender nor the casual mien of the proceedings was enough to keep Michkov from expressing his displeasure by starting a shoving match with the much bigger player.

Michkov is a player who lives around the slot. The entire goal of the game, as far as he’s concerned, is to territorially dominate the area immediately surrounding the net. From that territorial control, goals, and offensive creation is just a natural byproduct.

There are a lot of clever tricks and preternatural skills that go into his constant forays of the net, but it’s impossible to discount the sheer tenacity and fearlessness that he wields to complement such a play style. He doesn’t back down to Matteo Mann.

Hell, he takes the fight directly to Hunter MacDonald. The prospect who is renowned for his physical presence and sheer intimidation? He can not intimidate Michkov.

In all fairness, MacDonald is tripped here. But even if we remove the stick infraction that Michkov apologizes for as the play is concluded, it’s still an insightful glimpse into who the Russian prodigy is as a player.

A ruthless attacker of the net. He doesn’t park in front of MacDonald and wait to be boxed out by the larger man. Instead, he cuts suddenly around MacDonald to get behind him as the perimeter shot is coming.

The plan was always to deflect the shot, and as it happened this time, collect the rebound and take another chance at the net. But the tripping infraction made it all a bit easier.

Make no mistake, though. For as much as Michkov has the fearlessness and balance through contact to engage physically, his primary gifts are his smarts and his skill.

He almost redefines the word “smooth,” and makes complex moves effortless.

He can befuddle goalies with well-crafted fakes, then exploit the openings they leave with lightning-quick hands. And leave them throwing their head back, wondering how the hell they were ever supposed to stop this guy.

It’s hard to say someone lived up to the hype in rookie camp drills. That isn’t real. But Michkov did remind everyone why all of the hype exists in the first place. The Flyers’ brass needed no such reminder.

They know exactly what Michkov is, and they’re already putting it to strategic use. At the same moment as Matvei Michkov was being unveiled to the world, Jett Luchanko was being tested.

When they drafted Jett Luchanko, they did so knowing full well that there were other excellent players available. In part, they drafted him because of what they saw. Much of that is words best spilled at a later date, but suffice it to say that what they saw was only part of what drew the Flyers’ scouts to Luchanko.

What they didn’t see, but believed to be present nonetheless, was just as much of a factor behind their selection of the speedy center from Guelph. in the Flyers’ view, playing for the Guelph Storm was an anchor dropped on Luchanko’s offensive potential.

He had the ability to make highly advanced plays, they believed. He just didn’t have the teammates who could read the game with him, and help him connect those pieces.

Enter: Matvei Michkov. A true hockey genius. If Luchanko did have that latent ability, then Michkov would draw it out. If Michkov couldn’t draw it out? Well, it may just not be there. In that sense, it was a big day for Luchanko.

It was a chance to prove the Flyers right.

I won’t stand on ceremony and make you wade through flowery prose just to learn the ultimate results of this experiment. Here you go:

The pair of them found chemistry immediately. In some regards, they’re both cut from the same cloth. They’re both players who live on the edge of cerebral and tenacious. They’re both players who have something of a one-track mind as far as controlling the territory around the net is concerned.

Their similarities were most evident in that play that resulted in a beautiful Luchanko goal. It took both of them battling for a loose puck. Luchanko gave Michkov an outlet, and Michkov spotted it even through the fog of war…. because of course, he did.

A teammate of the Guelph Storm, and I mean no offense to any of them, probably doesn’t make that play. They probably don’t give Luchanko an open lane to cut to the slot and deke out the goalie.

Michkov’s hockey sense is special. His IQ for the sport is off the charts. The question was if Luchanko had the brains to keep up. If he could make all of the exotic reads that Matvei makes, and know where he’s going to be.

There was someone on X–a world-class coach, I’m led to believe–determined to inform me that this was the simplest play ever made in the most routine drill of all time. To the credit of this extremely obstinate coach, the drill is… of course… routine. I’m commenting on the play within the drill.

But more to the point, this play does seem… simple. It looks easy. In reality? It’s anything but. The essence of intelligence as it manifests itself through sport is often seeing the simple play that most people do not.

In the words of a fellow member of The Subsection, Chris: “The smartest players, the highest IQ plays, they are subtle. So subtle that in retrospect, they seem unimpressive and obvious, but if they were, why don’t we see it more often? It looks like a simple, easy play. It’s not. 2 dudes made an instinctive read to create a mismatch. There’s no stopping that.”

Luchanko is the original puck carrier in the drill. This happens off the screen, but he drives the middle lane and dishes the puck off to his winger. It’s a fairly simple play that happens all of the time.

Here’s the thing: when Luchanko drops a puck off to a winger in Guelph, things can and often do go awry.

When Luchanko drops a puck off to Matvei Michkov? You get something like this. Matvei patiently baits the incoming defender in… a coach for the purposes of the drill, but the concept is the same regardless of the environment…. then bounces a pass off of the boards and into open space.

Luchanko, at this point, has already built up forward momentum. With his natural speed, this is a big problem, even in a live game. He collects that puck, makes a turn, and immediately threads a pass to a waiting Michkov.

Michkov… who took the middle lane but remained high instead of crashing the net… was not in an intuitive spot. Watch any NHL rush, especially ones that aren’t conducted by geniuses of the sport, and the basic thing to do is to crash the net as the second forward in a rush.

Matvei knows that staying high will give him more space and thus make him more dangerous. Luchanko knows that’s what he’s going to do. He threads that pass.

Michkov has all day to do what he does best and score a goal.

Earlier, I tweeted this. And I was joking. But… I also wasn’t joking.

As much as someone can in practice drills, Luchanko passed the test. At least for now, we have every reason to believe that Jett would indeed be more dynamic and a more deceptive playmaker if he had the opportunity to play with higher-IQ players.

Unfortunately, Guelph can’t replicate Michkov. They can’t come close to replicating Michkov. Some of that is because they just aren’t a team that has a lot of talent around Luchanko, but most of that is because there just is not a talent quite like Michkov to easily replace him with.

I decided now would be a good time to share some thoughts that were sent to me by Liam Atkinson of Black Stitch Hockey, originally written by his father who has coached in the sport of hockey for a long time:

“It’s obvious he has every sort of IQ that you can ask for in the OZ. He has that clear ability for recognizing and understanding the ‘geometric’ patterns–which are super important to the sport–and attacking them with maximum efficiency. He has it all planned out before it ever happens. There’s another element to his ability to ‘create from nothing’ that he clearly has, too. It’s not just the matter of keeping the play alive when there’s nothing there. It’s the ‘surprise’ aspect because it’s impossible for teams to counter, because they know he CAN do it but they have no idea how it’ll unfold in any given situation. That’s effectively impossible to defend from a skill or even effort standpoint.”

For that, Guelph has no obvious substitute. It would be almost cruel to take him from Michkov straight back to the same players he was dealing with before.

But it isn’t a one-sided relationship, either. See, Michkov is a lot like Kucherov in one regard. Their spatial awareness and anticipation skills serve as the primary underpinnings of their game.

He’s an assassin on the ice who weaves his way subtly into the most well-guarded area and executes his target with ruthless efficiency. He can do that with many people.

But Luchanko’s mixture of speed and two-way attentiveness makes him a perfect diversion. He’s going to attract attention just with the way he skates and the way he battles for the puck. He’s a strobe light blinding the opposition while Michkov slithers behind them and robs them of everything they hold dear.

Kucherov is far from rendered ineffective without Brayden Point, but he’s doubtlessly maximized by Brayden Point. A stealth operative working behind a strobe light diversion.

It’s a glimpse of what will eventually be for the Flyers.

But… depending on how things go for Luchanko between now and opening day… why not start now?

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