Finn Harding

And I think is a lot closer to being an option for us than people realize or give credit for on the outside.

I think that the decision with Owen Pickering and Harrison Brunick was, what's the best developmentally? Do you want them to be here just to say that they're here and they're in the NHL? To go back to the press conference, the question of are you unhappy that those guys are not on the NHL roster? We could put them on there if we want to say we're developing guys, but the reality of it is we would much rather have those two in particular, plus Chase Pietula, plus Finn Harding, plus Jake Livinovich, with Wilkes-Barre playing massive minutes and not getting a game or two every once in a while here, especially early in the season.

You know, Pietila, I think, deserved much more than we were able to give him in preseason.

He's a victim of the circumstance of the change in the format.

Um, I mean, they have a few options, but Rizzo, Justin Rizzo, he's healthy, he's skating.

Eric Coon has a question about Finn Harding and the way he played.

He had some nice hits against the Red Wings.

Harding was put into a bad spot in that game.

But at the same time, uh, Galvis was f- it was a little bit rough for him, and very understandable.

Very understandable.

Yeah, I, I mean, I don't know what the, like, what about Finn Harding [laughs] 'cause, like, he's, he's not going to make the team out of camp.

No, no, no.

Declan Carlisle with Ilya Solovyov, that is new.

Then Thomas Galvis is going to make his preseason debut with Finn Harding, who is his babysitter, translator, even though Finn Harding doesn't speak Czech.

So that'll be fun.

And that even goes back to the Prospects Challenge last week.

Like, I, I, I like, listen, I, I've, I've talked about this guy before.

Every time I watch Finn Harding play, like, that guy's gonna be Ben Lovejoy in a couple of years.

Yeah.

Like, there's going to be-- He's gonna be Chad Ruhwedel or Ben Lovejoy, and that's not a knock.

The only problem he has right now is [laughs] look at all the righties that you have.

Van Riemsdyk's playing on the left side because there's already three righties in front of him, and that doesn't include Harrison Brunck.

So where do you want Finn Harding to play right now? But a couple of years from now when Karlsson and Letang are gone, and when Van Riemsdyk's gone, um, I think there's a real chance Finn Harding's, like, the third pairing defenseman maybe behind Brunck.

Yeah.