The Elite League Series has sparked much interest in the UK hockey scene, mostly thanks to a one-off event.

A British draft for the four competing teams generated a lot of excitement with coverage of the event live on Facebook, complete with trades and team representatives explaining their selections.

Sheffield, Nottingham, Manchester and Coventry selected seven players each and then added extras for a taxi squad to cover injury and absences.

The Blaze selected five protected players of which four will definitely be available from the beginning of the upcoming series.

Goaltender: Jordan Hedley (24yo)
Defenseman: David Clements (26yo)
Forward: Alex Forbes (24yo)
Forward: Ross Venus (26yo)
Forward: Luke Ferrara (27yo)

As per the Coventry Blaze website: “Luke Ferrara will continue to play in Poland with Krakow, so as long as they remain in the playoffs.
Krakow beat Torun in the quarter-finals by four games to two and will face the number-one seed Tychy in the semi-finals in a best-of-seven game series.
The first four games will be played on the 11th, 12th, 15th and 16th of March.
As and when Krakow’s season ends, Ferrara will then return to the UK.”

As much fun as the draft was with the first overall pick being traded, Ben Bowns being taken at #1 and many players having been selected by teams they would normally be arch-rivals with, it was Coventry’s selections in particular that caught my eye.

Coventry Blaze Head Coach Danny Stewart opted to go with youth for the majority of his picks much to the surprise of all interested onlookers.

After taking vastly experienced and proven talent in Mike Hammond and Paul Swindlehurst in the first two rounds, the five selections that followed were players in the 21-23 age range.

First-pick: Mike Hammond (31yo Centreman)

Second-pick: Paul Swindlehurst (27yo Defenseman)

Third-pick: Cole Shudra (22yo Defenseman/Forward)

Fourth-pick: Sam Duggan (22yo RW/Centreman)

Fifth-pick: Mac Howlett (21yo Centreman)

Sixth-pick: Toms Rutkis (23yo LW/Centreman)

Seventh-pick: Ivan Antonov (23yo RW)

The taxi squad selections had an even more youthful look to them with a pair of teenagers and a twenty-year-old.

The Blaze picked:

Sam Russell (20yo Defenseman)

Will Bray (17yo Goaltender)

Austin Mitchell-King (19yo Forward)

Now even allowing for the fact that Coventry will add import players to their roster as confirmed after the draft, it’s highly encouraging that the Blaze opted to give so many younger British players a chance on their roster.

Admittedly these are very different times but it’s still a bold move that should be applauded.
The Elite League has always shied away from giving younger players their head for the most part with the emphasis on winning today and not worrying too much about tomorrow.

Before further additions, Coventry’s average roster age is 24.66 with only five players on the ‘wrong side’ of twenty-five.

I am excited to see Ivan Antonov receive a shot in the Elite League, and the pair of Mac Howlett and Sam Duggan hopefully thrive with more ice-time and extended responsibilities.

There will doubtless be lots of interesting facets to this five-week tournament but it’s Coventry’s young roster including some untested Brits that fascinates me the most.

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