Dmitri Samorukov's development is on-track, and he'll fill a pro need for the Oilers

2018 Oilers prospects, No. 10: LD Dmitri Samorukov

A year after falling to the Edmonton Oilers late in the third round, No. 84 overall, defenceman Dmitri Samorukov has made modest improvements on his value as a prospect with a season of solid growth.

Certainly the hope was that Samorukov would evolve in his second season in North America. Multiple independent services commented that Samorukov looked more comfortable playing internationally than he had in his debut season in the OHL; even Edmonton’s Bob Green noted that his tournament work had been a selling point for the Oilers.

“We saw him play in Guelph this year,” Green said. “He’s a good skater; he’s a nice-sized kid. He moves the puck really well. He had a really good U-18, we thought he took over the games over there a little bit more offensively, he tried to push the game a little bit more on the power play, so that was impressive.

“He’s not a real physical guy but he likes to step up and if he sees opportunity he can make big open-ice hits and we like that about him as well.”

The steady development Samorukov ended up showing wasn’t a given. He was one of six defencemen drafted out of major junior between picks No. 50 and 100 in 2017, and their draft+1 seasons were a mixed bag.

Injuries derailed the year of Pens’ prospect Zachary Lauzon. Scott Walford and Eemeli Rasanen started out ahead of Samorukov and were drafted earlier, but were (narrowly) leapfrogged by the Edmonton pick in points-per-game after flat years offensively. By that one measure, half the sample group didn’t log improvement.

Samorukov did, despite some unique challenges. In his review of the Oilers’ farm system on Friday, The Athletic’s Corey Pronman hinted at one of the reasons why Samorukov’s offensive growth was impressive.

“He’ll likely never get big power play minutes on the same team as Ryan Merkley, but Samorukov showed good puck-moving ability,” wrote Pronman. “He’s a good skater who can jump up into the attack and evade pressure.”

Samorukov’s climb from four goals to 11 and 20 points to 34 was thus impressive in the context of playing for the Guelph Storm. Prospect watchers will be familiar with Merkley, a polarizing player whose offensive ability is so overwhelming that he was a 2018 first-round selection despite the widespread perception that he had other significant flaws. Merkley and overager Garrett McFadden were Guelph’s top power play options, and defencemen tend to be especially dependent on special teams work for their point production.

He won’t ever be Merkley offensively — almost nobody is — but Samorukov has real skill in that area. At 5-on-5 he produced a respectable 20 points, three more than McFadden for second place on the Guelph blue line.

Given Samorukov’s situation, it’s reasonable to think his scoring has been suppressed somewhat by the presence of other options, particularly since he has 10 points in 12 career games internationally against the world’s best under-18 players. In that case the departure of McFadden should allow him to take another step forward next season.

The big selling feature for Samorukov is that he can do more than just play a modern NHL game with the puck. He’s also 6-foot-2 and an above-average skater, which is an attractive toolkit even if he hasn’t put it all together yet.

“His calling card is his offense, but he needs to shore up his defensive play,” says Pronman. “Samorukov isn’t the toughest on his checks, and he can get beat a little too often.”

In Samorukov’s defence, he was hardly the only player in Guelph who was getting beaten a little too often. The Storm finished 30-29-9, eight games below .500, and they were knocked out in the first round of the OHL playoffs. His 46 per cent on-ice goal share at 5-on-5 wasn’t ideal, but it outpaced that of every other regular on the team, including Merkley (43.7 GF%) and McFadden (40.4 GF%).

Still, it’s important to be realistic about his NHL upside. Between 2006 and 2011, the OHL produced 16 defencemen in their draft+1 seasons who would go on to play at least 100 NHL games by the age of 25. Ten of those 16 were significantly better scorers than Samorukov at the same age, including all nine of the 10 who had topped the 200-game mark by that age.

What Samorukov needs to do is continue to progress. Another step forward in his final year of junior will put him in excellent position to graduate to the pro ranks, and a year or two of steady development at that level will have him knocking at the door of NHL employment. That’s up to the player and to good fortune health-wise; already we’ve seen some of Samorukov’s peer group stumble a bit in the early going.

Samorukov’s potential NHL timeline also works well for the Oilers.

Edmonton has a bunch of left-shot defencemen in the majors but in the pipeline the club’s three most significant players are Samorukov, Caleb Jones and William Lagesson. Jones is entering his second year in the AHL, while Lagesson was playing 21 minutes per game in the SHL playoffs; both should be in the NHL recall conversation this year and pushing for full-time work no later than next fall if they have healthy development.

If all goes as hoped, Samorukov will turn pro just in time to fill a vacancy.

Previously in this series:

(Main photo: Dmitri Samorukov (front) celebrates a goal at the U-18 world championships. Credit: Yelena Rusko/TASS via Getty Images)