New Flame Lundmark could provide scoring punch
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By Craig DeVrieze | Thursday, July 17, 2008 |
With top scorers Grant Stevenson and Krys Kolanos having signed with the parent clubs of division rivals, Ryan McGill knows goals are going to have to come from somewhere for his Quad-City Flames.
If the source is Jamie Lundmark, that will be fine with McGill.
“You know we didn’t score easy last year,” McGill said of a club whose 203 goals were the second-lowest American Hockey League total last season. “Hopefully, he can create opportunities we were lacking in the past.’’
Lundmark, a center, is a former first-round NHL pick who has scored 27 goals and dished 44 assists in 232 games at the NHL level. He signed Wednesday with the Calgary Flames, a team he spent parts of two seasons with from 2005 through 2007.
The 27-year-old from Edmonton, Alberta, also has played 220 games in the AHL, launching his pro career under McGill in Hartford in 2001-2002, when he scored 27 goals and dished 32 assists in 79 games.
“His first couple of years in the AHL, he had real good numbers,” said the coach. “When he went to New York (with the parent Rangers) he just had trouble scoring at the next level.”
Lundmark played parts of three seasons with the Rangers from 2002 through 2006, did a 38-game stint with Phoenix in 2005-2006 and then signed with the Flames later that year.
He played 39 games with the Flames, dishing just four assists, then scored seven goals in 29 games with the L.A. Kings.
He started last year in Russia before returning to the U.S., where the Flames attempted to claim his rights but were beaten out by the Lake Erie Monsters.
One of Lundmark’s 13 goals in 51 games with the Cleveland AHL club came against McGill’s Flames.
Now, with Stevenson a potential rival with the Chicago Wolves and Kolanos a possibility to show up in Moline wearing a Houston Aeros jersey, Lundmark could be a key piece of the Q-C puzzle.
“He can pass the puck, and we hope that helps our younger guys,” McGill said. “We will be putting pressure on him to help in a lot of ways.’’
McGill will get a look at many of the youngsters likely to land here when the Calgary Flames convene prospects camp next week in Alberta.
The coach said the mission of the week-long camp is to discern what aspects of their games players need to work on when rookie camp and training camp begin in September, and said he won’t be scouting for a possible Q-C roster next week.
“One thing I think I have been good at is not taking a lot of preconceived ideas into this camp,” he said. “It will be about seeing where their skills are and how we can help them develop for training camp.”
Two players of certain interest at the camp, though, will be rookie goaltender Leland Irving, a 2006 first-round selection, and second-year center Dan Ryder, who played just four games for the Q-C Flames last year before stepping away from the game for personal reasons.
“I am looking forward to seeing him,” McGill said of Ryder. “There is a lot of potential there we don’t want to waste. I am looking forward to talking to him, to see where he is.”
Craig DeVrieze can be contacted at (563) 333-2610 or cdevrieze@qctimes.com.
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