Building Blue: OHLer Kirill Kudryavtsev Continues to Improve with Pro Hockey in his Sights

Amid his third OHL season, left-shot defenceman Kirill Kudryavtsev is beginning to make the necessary adjustments to his game in preparation for professional hockey.

Drafted in the seventh round of the 2022 NHL Entry Draft, Kudryavtsev looked like a solid pickup in the final round of the draft. He showed some offensive skill as a 17-year-old in the OHL during his 2021-22 season and there looked to be potential in his game due to his strengths with the puck on his stick.

Kudryavtsev comes in at 6’0”, 201 pounds, and uses his strength in the corners to be able to come out with the puck often in one-on-one battles. He had to make adjustments in his second season and wanted to be more of a two-way defenceman who could be trusted in all areas of the ice. The young blueliner accomplished that and now, he’s continuing to build his game in his third OHL season with the Soo Greyhounds. After getting to the point where he feels better about his defensive game, it’s now time for him to focus back on contributing offensively at the OHL level.

“I'm definitely a two-way defenseman,” said Kudryavtsev. “But I would say I need to work more on my offence. That’s the one area where I can be more efficient. Honestly, right now, especially for the OHL, I’m playing very good defensively. But offensively I can be much more dangerous. I’m currently working on improving my shooting ability. I don't know the answer yet but I'm working on it more. I’m also working with my skating coach and watching video of Quinn Hughes. We are working on some things so I can move my feet better and be able to get back quicker.”

The 20-year-old spoke highly of the Canucks’ captain and learns a lot from watching how Hughes commands the ice with the puck on his stick. One part of Hughes’ game that Kudryavtsev is trying to learn is how he can start plays from behind his net.

As much as Kudryavtsev is focused on making a run for the OHL championship, he can’t help but think about preparing his game for the jump to pro hockey after this season. Kudryavtsev has been a part of two Canucks training camps and he has taken away a lot from those experiences on-ice with pros.

Canucks development coach Mike Komisarek spoke highly of Kudryavtsev and his commitment to the rink during the most recent Canucks development camp.

“Kirill is a super driven guy,” said Komisarek. “You saw him at development camp this year, he was pretty much living at the rink. He couldn't get enough of it. He is just a sponge around professional players as well. He loves being around pros at the rink and they seem to love him too.”

One thing that Kudryavtsev tried this summer was focusing on one of his strengths so that he had an improvement in his game that he could show at training camp. Something that he learned from his first camp in 2022 was that the pros are just so fast and that skating is so important for pro players. The rearguard went into development camp this summer and viewed his skating as the skill that he wanted to put a lot of emphasis on.

This included working with a skating coach during the summer in Vancouver. He continues to use Hughes as the example of improvement that he is looking for and to be able to skate with Hughes and the rest of the Canucks’ defence corps helped Kudryavtsev understand what level he needs to get his skating up to so that he is successful when he makes the jump to the pro ranks.

From the 2023 camp, Kudryavtsev viewed his strength on the puck as the next part of his game that he wanted to emphasize in the summer. He knows that the AHL is going to be a big step up from his current competition in the OHL and if he is to be successful in the pro ranks, his strength on the puck will need to be at the level that he expects for himself.

On top of his physical skills, Kudryavtsev is focusing on improving the mental part of the game – more specifically, his ability to make quick decisions that help the team.

“Sometimes you just have to chip the puck away when you are playing guys in the NHL or AHL too,” said Kudryavtsev. “You may have to just dump it in the o-zone and forecheck. In our league, and all the junior leagues, sometimes you hold on to the puck too much and in pros, you must be quick, otherwise, you will get turnovers. There, everybody's faster, everybody is going to want to finish their check on you and you have to be ready for that.”

You may wonder about where Kudryavtsev is getting this knowledge about the pros from and the answer would be that it comes from spending much of his summer in Vancouver before this season. Kudryavtsev skated with Abbotsford Canucks players who were around town such as Vasily Podkolzin and Danila Klimovich.

Kudryavtsev also got a taste of NHL talent in the summer when he was skating with a group in the Lower Mainland that included Connor Bedard, Mat Barzal, and Alex Kerfoot.

As a 20-year-old, in his third OHL season, the next step for Kudryavtsev will be to go pro. He’s got aspirations to play in the NHL but is content with taking the minor-league path to get there. 

Kudryavtsev has already fallen in love with the West Coast and is excited to get back to wearing the blue and green as a Canuck. He loved the bus ride up to Penticton this summer and said that he enjoyed taking in the beautiful scenery that British Columbia has to offer.

“I love it, especially Vancouver with all the big buildings. I also love the mountains, the forests, and the lakes. I was lucky, or maybe not lucky, but I enjoyed the four-hour bus ride [to Young Stars in Penticton]. Maybe I’d love to take the plane sometimes but this time I liked the views from the bus,” said Kudryavtsev with a laugh.

We are fast approaching Kudryavtsev moving on from junior hockey and he continues to work on his game so that he can find success at the next level. He is showing well in the OHL and he hopes to ride that momentum right into the offseason where another summer of focused training will help him make even more improvements before he officially suits up in pro hockey.