West, a quarterback, threw a pair of touchdown passes in Edina’s 42-35 win against Moorhead to capture the state crown.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ll always have football in hand,” he said, “but I\u2019m all hockey now and I kind of love it because I can dedicate my time to hockey and focus on things I need to get better at.\u201d<\/p>\n
Indeed, it’s back to hockey for West, who is part of the United States\u2019 roster for the World Junior Summer Showcase in Windsor, Ontario, which ends Saturday. Players from the U.S., Canada, Finland and Sweden attended the 10-game showcase in preparation for the 2027 IIHF World Junior Championship, set for Dec. 26-Jan. 5, 2027, in Edmonton and Red Deer, Alberta.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s such a great opportunity,\u201d West said. \u201cIt\u2019s something I\u2019m thinking about now. Whenever I\u2019m in the workout room, whenever I\u2019m on the ice, I\u2019m thinking, \u2018What can I do to get better, what can I do to help make that team and help them win a gold medal?\u2019 I\u2019m super excited and hungry to make that team.\u201d<\/p>\n
West (6-foot-6, 215 pounds) will play at Michigan State this fall. The No. 29 pick by the Blackhawks in the 2025 NHL Draft joins a roster that includes five first-round picks from the 2026 NHL Draft.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnytime with big players it\u2019s playing to an identity,” Michigan State hockey coach Adam Nightingale said. “Every time you move up you\u2019re playing against bigger, stronger guys and for him, it\u2019s using his frame to both protect the puck, kick the puck to the net and then also when he doesn\u2019t have it, using his size and reach and physicality to end plays.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think that\u2019s pretty common for guys at his size is really embracing what it means to play the game like a power forward.\u201d<\/p>\n
West took his latest step in that quest with Fargo of the United States Hockey League, where he had 25 points (10 goals, 15 assists) in 38 games last season; because West came straight from football to Fargo, it took a little time for him to adjust, opposed to 2024-25, when he arrived immediately after playing high school hockey with Edina, where he had 49 points (27 goals, 22 assists) in 31 games.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cHe was skating 1-on-0 on the ice and doing some skating stuff, but it\u2019s just a totally different beast,” Fargo coach Brett Skinner said. “He started three months late, never mind just missing training camp. But I give him a ton of credit. It speaks to his talent level and what he\u2019s capable of that he can come into that time of year and be able to do what he did the second half of the year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"West, a quarterback, threw a pair of touchdown passes in Edina’s 42-35 win against Moorhead to capture the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":839677,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[433],"tags":[49,48,448,82],"class_list":["post-839676","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-nhl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/839676","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=839676"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/839676\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/839677"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=839676"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=839676"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=839676"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}