On how becoming the next Miro Heiskanen is a lofty but somehow realistic goal

Some thoughts on a player that has defined generic excellence and how NHL prospects look up to him.

I’m currently in London, Ontario, getting ready for the first annual CHL-USA Prospects Challenge, which is a two-game series between the top United States National Development Program Under-18 team and the top Under-18 prospects currently playing in the CHL.

And Blake Fiddler is one of the assistant captains for Team CHL.

Fiddler is a pretty smooth skating 6-foot-4 defender, he’s ranked 14th for the upcoming draft board by my colleagues at Elite Prospects, and he also happens to be Vernon Fiddler’s son.

That part that made me feel ancient, that I’ve now done this long enough where players I covered in the NHL are old enough to have children that are eligible for the NHL Draft.

I’m working on another story about Fiddler for Elite Prospects, and I’ll dive into his game and decision to pick either Team USA or Team Canada there, but one thing that stood out to me from our conversation is how much Miro Heiskanen has now become the model defenseman for prospects, like Fiddler, who have now effectively grown up watching the Stars defender.

I spoke to a handful of defensive prospects yesterday, including Fiddler, and nearly all of them mentioned how they’d like to model their game after Heiskanen as they eventually move to the next level.

And I think it’s something that’s worth exploring, because while trying to model your game after one of the NHL’s elite defenders is lofty, Heiskanen has one of the few archetypes that every prospect, in theory, can actually try to emulate.