McGinn
By Dave Pollard, Guelphstorm.com exclusive
It didn’t take long for Guelph Storm rookie Brock McGinn to make quite an impression on new general manager Mike Kelly.
Halfway through his first season of junior hockey and just weeks into Kelly’s second stint running the Storm, McGinn is being compared to a former Ontario Hockey League standout who now toils for the NHL’s Dallas Stars.
“One of the greatest compliments is he’s the closest clone to Stevie Ott, who I had in Windsor, that I’ve come across in 10 years, quite frankly,” Kelly said when asked about McGinn, the Storm’s third-round draft pick in 2010. “His skating style, his demeanor, his ability on the forecheck to get right up on a man and explode without taking a penalty, his intelligence, his bite” (makes McGinn stand out). He’s a 16-year-old kid and I don’t want to put too much pressure on him but if anybody has a pro makeup, this kid has it.”
Kelly’s not one given to hyperbole, has never thrown around compliments or comparisons without good reason, in his 20 years of managing, coaching and scouting junior players.
So Kelly likening McGinn to Ott, one of the best OHLers in recent memory to combine grit, skill — he had 116 goals and 121 assists in 174 games with the Windsor Spitfires from 1999 to 2002 — and the ability to get under his opponent’s skin, is as high praise as you’ll see. The similarities between Ott, who has played more than 400 games with the Stars, and the slight redhead from Fergus don’t end there.
“(McGinn) is fearless,” Kelly said. “When Otter came to us at 17 (he weighed) 154 pounds and Brock at 16 is probably 145 pounds but, wow, is he a hockey player.”
Kelly is bang on. McGinn, listed at 5-foot-11 and 163 pounds but probably a little smaller, plays the game without fear. He’ll hit anyone, regardless of size. He’s shown a willingness to drop the gloves a couple and had a scrap with Kitchener Rangers 19-year-old forward Ryan Lopes.
All in all, McGinn plays a style that goes a long way towards impressing people like coaches and general managers. But ask him about his game and McGinn simply shrugs and offers few words.
“I just try to play an easy, simple game at both ends of the ice,” he said. “I’m just trying to keep it the same, simple. It’s worked out so far. Getting beat up by my brothers when I was younger, I’m not scared of anybody. I try to play a physical game.”
Ah, yes, the big brothers.
The eldest, Jamie, if you don’t recall, had a great junior career with the Ottawa 67’s and now plays for the San Jose Sharks. Tye, the middle brother in Fergus’s first family of hockey, is an overager with the Gatineau Olympiques of the QMJHL and a fourth-round draft pick of the Philadelphia Flyers last summer.
If hockey bloodlines count for anything, McGinn has them in spades.
“Don’t forget his (great) grandfather, too, Jimmy Tye,” Kelly said, referring to the long-time Toronto Maple Leafs scout. “This goes back. He’s got bloodlines, hard-nosed, honest, blue-collar bloodlines. This kid likes the game, respects the game and takes nothing for granted and asks for nothing.”
Don’t sell the lessons McGinn learned from his brothers short, either. What he learned goofing around in the backyard rink against his brothers is paying dividends now.
“My parents would spend late nights building an ice rink in our back yard,” McGinn said with a grin. “Us three would go out and play some shinny and just beat on each other, make each other stronger and better players. Me and my oldest brother, Jamie, we’d always pick on Tye. We’d tag-team him.”
Interestingly enough, the original plan called for McGinn to play with the Georgetown Raiders this season. That way he could make the transition from minor hockey in Guelph to major junior more seemlessly.
McGinn knew that was the plan but, somewhere along the line in training camp, it got thrown out the window.
“I guess I impressed them in tryouts,” McGinn said. “I just tried to play my game, simple, crash and bang and I guess they liked how I played. I was really hoping that I’d make the team but if not I’d go back to Georgetown and play Tier II. It’s awesome (playing for the Storm). Growing up watching them, when I was younger my family has season tickets. It’s a dream playing for (the team)I’ve grown up watching.”
Jason Brooks, who started the season as the Storm’s coach and general manager, decided he couldn’t send McGinn to Tier II.
“In retrospect, Brooksy made a call that was right on,” Kelly said. “You could not have kept this kid (off the team). He’s just moving up our depth chart. If he keeps going like this … I mean right now he’s probably getting 22 minutes a game or thereabouts. You can play him in all situations. I haven’t given him a lot of power play time but eventually he’s going to earn that. Earning it is the key. This kid doesn’t want anything (handed to him), there’s no entitlement. He goes out and gives you his damnedest. He’s got an innate hockey sense as well.”
Although McGinn plays a gritty game, that hockey sense is one reason why Kelly expects big things out of him eventually. Some believe the forward will be a 20-25 goal scorer when he matures — he’s only got two in his first 37 OHL games — but the GM expects McGinn to be far more productive.
“I see more than that at this level,” Kelly said. “I anticipate he’s going to be a 30 to 40 goal guy as a 19-year-old. This kid is going to be special.I think he’s going to be a kid we’re going to be talking about as one of those special, Manny Malhotra, Dustin Brown, type of players. It comes from his character and his drive. He’s a humble type of kid.”
McGinn, like fellow 16-year-olds on the Storm, defenceman Matt Finn and forward Scott Kosmachuk, is making it easy for new Storm coach Scott Walker to increase their ice time. All three have been coming on of late and could see bigger roles down the stretch.
“Those three 94s are really coming into their own,” Kelly said. “I congratulate Brooksy and the scouting staff. Kosmachuk, who is getting more and more ice time, is just getting better. Some of our older players who maybe thought that somehow or other it was their right to get certain minutes and to play on certain lines, they better be looking over their shoulders. These kids are coming.
“They’re not asking permission, they’re just earning everything they get. I’ll be damned if I’m going to step in anybody’s way who wants to earn more ice time.”
