Penguins forward prospect Lukas Svejkovsky enjoying a ‘learning year’
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From the outside, the changes for Lukas Svejkovsky between the junior and the pro level are easy to identify.
The numbers.
Last season, Svejkovsky was a prolific producer in the Western Hockey League, posting 76 points (35 goals, 41 assists) in 57 games split between the Medicine Hat Tigers and Seattle Thunderbirds.
This season, Svejkovsky, in his first professional season, has been able to muster a mere 13 points (three goals, 10 assists) in 43 games with the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins of the American Hockey League (AHL).
For Svejkovsky himself, the biggest differences over the past year are more profound.
“It’s definitely a big jump, junior to pro, on and off the ice,” the 21-year-old forward said. “Living by myself for the first time. Really having to take care of myself for the first time. No (billet families) around or parents.”
A fourth-round pick (No. 108 overall) of the Pittsburgh Penguins in 2020, Svejkovsky is under no illusion as to what his first professional campaign would be like.
There would be more growing pains than points.
And he appears to be fully grasping the process of learning what the professional game is like.
“I’m not really too focused on points at all,” Svejkovsky said via video conference Friday. “Those will come if I just stick to my game and play well. I just focus on bringing the same thing every night. Just playing fast and skilled and just competing every night and every shift. It’s definitely a bit of an adjustment putting up a lot of numbers in junior.
“But I’m not really too worried about that here. It’s a big jump from junior. I’m just trying to learn from the older guys and just trying to get better as the season goes along. I think that’s what I’ve been doing.”
Like a lot of first-year professionals, the biggest adjustment to playing in the AHL for the first time is getting used to playing against grown men. And at a lithe 5-foot-9 and 170 pounds, that task can be amplified for someone like Svejkovsky.
“He’s got a ton of skill,” Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins coach J.D. Forrest said. “He’s got speed. He’s really young. And he’s trying to figure out how exactly to maximize his skillset in a bigger, tougher, strong league. Also for him, it’s consistency. Being dialed in all the time. There’s stretches where he’s really, really effective and he’s figured out to bounce off and get around guys and not get pinned in and stalled. How to continue to move his feet through some heavier traffic and some bigger (defensemen). He’s got the ability to make some space on his own, especially when he has the puck.
“The challenge for him right now is the consistency portion and the continuing to meet the challenge of bigger, better defenders.”
The son of former NHL forward Jaroslav “Yogi” Svejkovsky, Lukas Svejkovsky was prolific at the junior level because he was one of the most talented players on the ice most nights and often deployed as a first-liner or on the top power-play unit.
Primarily utilized as a bottom-six forward with limited special team opportunities with Wilkes-Barre/Scranton to this point of the season, Svejkovsky realizes the gap in skill and physical attributes isn’t nearly as profound in the AHL, if it exists in his favor whatsoever.
“I feel like in junior, your last year, you can get away with little mistakes,” Svejkovsky said. “But you can’t do it here. You can’t hide. Bringing the same thing to the plate every single night. You can’t take a shift off or a night off. Just being a super consistent player. Coaches have been great with that as well whether it’s going over video or showing me little things, little details that I can work on.
“It’s been a learning year for me for sure. I just want to get a little bit better every single day.”