Jiricek nets first goal of what will likely be many

The Blue Jackets assigned defenseman David Jiricek to AHL Cleveland when the team set its opening-night roster Monday, but they likely told the 2022 first-round pick it wouldn’t be very long until he was back in Columbus.

In the end, it took four days. Friday morning, Jiricek was headed to meet the Monsters for their trip to their season opener at Lehigh Valley when he got the call – he was needed in Columbus because of the injury to Zach Werenski.

There would be no stopping at Grandpa’s Cheesebarn or the Lodi outlets on this trip, with CBJ practice scheduled for noon Friday.

“I was ready to go to Lehigh today in Cleveland, and they just called me in the morning, and I hopped in the car and came here,” Jiricek said after that Friday practice. “I was on the way to the airport.”

The capper to a whirlwind couple of days came Saturday night, as the 19-year-old played in his fifth NHL game and scored his first career goal, the game-winner in the Blue Jackets’ 5-3 victory over the New York Rangers in Nationwide Arena.

Moments after the ice was cleared from hats tossed in celebration of captain Boone Jenner’s second career hat trick, Patrik Laine found Jiricek at the top of the right circle. Rangers wing Artemi Panarin gave Jiricek plenty of time and space, a mistake given Jiricek’s noted shooting ability, and the Czech defenseman got to the top of the circle and wired a wrister through traffic and over the glove of Igor Shesterkin.

“I saw the lane,” Jiricek said. “There was good traffic in front of the goalie, so I just tried to get it through. He didn’t see the shot.”

After the goal, Jiricek – just the 14th teenager and third teenage defenseman to score in a game for the CBJ – raised his left arm in celebration and then gave a pumping of the fist, kicking his left leg up as well. Postgame, he said the puck would likely be sent home to his parents, Libor and Lenka, in Klatovy, Czechia, who stay up and watch all of his games despite the time difference in Eastern Europe.

That kind of offensive ability is inside Jiricek, who often gets typecast as a defensive defenseman because of his 6-foot-4 frame and long stick. While Jiricek’s size and aggressiveness do make him an effective defender – he's not afraid to step up and take away time and space – he also has a booming shot and the ability to impact the game in the offensive zone.

In other words, he’s a 200-foot defenseman who projects as a first-pair player, which is one reason the Blue Jackets selected Jiricek sixth overall in the 2022 draft. He was excellent in the AHL a season ago, earning an All-Star bid, and also was called up to play four games with the Blue Jackets.

The Blue Jackets believe he can hold his own in the NHL right now, but at the same time, Pascal Vincent has likened developing young players to baking a cake. The head coach has warned of the perils of taking the cake out of the oven too soon even if it looks ready, and considering Jiricek also did not need to pass through waivers to head to Cleveland, the decision was made to start him in Cleveland this year.

“He was close (to making the opening roster), and we said it,” Vincent said. “He’s a very good player. He’s going to be a Blue Jacket, and he’s going to be a great player for us. But going back to the cake analogy, we want to be careful. If we feel he’s ready and it works with the hockey side and the business side, that’s no problem.

“But he’s a real good player. He had a real good camp. We believe in him. He’s like (Adam) Fantilli and those young guys; he’s like a diamond. We have to make sure we protect those guys, but he’s going to be a real good player.”

Jiricek admitted he was disappointed, as any competitor would be, to not make the opening roster but said his goal was just to put his head down and work in Cleveland. When he was recalled, he said his hope now is to make it as difficult as possible to take him out of the lineup.

“I am a hockey player, so I’m not going to lie, I was really disappointed,” he said Friday. “But I just wanted to grind in Cleveland and get back as fast as I could when it happened, so I am l glad to be here right now. I just want to play my best tomorrow and we’ll see what is going to happen after. We just want to win the next game, and in this business, you never know. We will see.”

One game in, the Blue Jackets have that win and Jiricek was a major part of it. And yet again, Vincent was impressed with his young defenseman after the game.

“I like him,” Vincent said. “He’s a guy that came here and had a real good camp and got better as training camp went on. We know what he can do. I think a big piece about Jiri is he’s a confident man. He knows he can play here. He just showed it to us, which is great.”