ST. PAUL, Minn. \u2014 Charlie Stramel has blocked so many shots in his life, just imagine his disappointment March 28 when X-rays revealed that an innocuous one from the point cracked his ankle in a second-round meeting against his former school, now-Frozen Four-bound Wisconsin.<\/p>\n
\u201cJust hit me in a bad spot,\u201d Stramel said.<\/p>\n
With one shot block early in the first period of the regional final, one of Michigan State\u2019s best players\u2019 NCAA championship dreams ended. So did his college career and plans of making his NHL debut in one of the Minnesota Wild\u2019s final five regular-season games.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think initially kind of just in shock that it happened at that time,\u201d Stramel said during a Zoom with reporters Tuesday afternoon after signing his entry-level contract with his home-state Wild the night before. \u201cAnd right there, I was just trying to root for the guys, hoping that they could get it done.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut I did kind of notice when we got the X-rays back that it\u2019s gonna be a little bit different route than I expected, but that\u2019s part of the game. Things happen in hockey, and you\u2019ve got to be prepared for that. So right now, just rehabbing and working on getting back healthy.\u201d<\/p>\n
Make no mistake, Stramel\u2019s plans have changed dramatically.<\/p>\n
The Wild and the 2023 first-rounder\u2019s representatives had agreed to a three-year contract that would have seen him burn the first year of the deal and debut this regular season after his college career ended.<\/p>\n
In fact, the Wild were still willing to burn the first year of the deal if his recovery had timed up with them still being in the playoffs. But after Michigan State\u2019s doctor consulted with the Wild\u2019s ankle specialist, it was determined he\u2019d need six to eight weeks to recover, making a playoff return unlikely.<\/p>\n
There are pros and cons to burning a year or not, and at the end of the day, his agents also decided it would benefit Stramel financially to have his contract start in 2026-27. That\u2019s because next year\u2019s contract falls under the new collective bargaining agreement while this year\u2019s would have fallen under the expiring one.<\/p>\n
So Stramel\u2019s contract is now for three years at $3.225 million as opposed to $2.85 million with escalating salaries each year and larger and escalating signing bonuses each year ($322,500 in total versus $285,000 in total).<\/p>\n
Stramel attended a Wild game on Jan. 22 \u2014 a 4-3 overtime win over the Detroit Red Wings that ended with a Kirill Kaprizov winner. Before that game, he sat down with Wild coach John Hynes.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s disappointing, I think, for him and for us he got injured at the end, but I\u2019m glad that we were able to sign him and that he\u2019s now a Minnesota Wild and hopefully his recovery goes well and we\u2019ll see him soon,\u201d Hynes said Tuesday.<\/p>\n
Stramel, 21, has turned into an impressive, promising and important prospect for a Wild team that\u2019s eternally been seeking to improve center depth. The biggest reason is his size \u2014 he\u2019s 6-foot-3, can skate and is a right shot who won the second-most faceoffs in college hockey.<\/p>\n
\u201cI had a few tough years at Wisconsin, hockey-wise, but I think I learned a lot about myself, and making that move to Michigan State, I think, was crucial for me in my career,\u201d Stramel said. \u201cHow that staff really helped develop me and find my game again, the culture they have here, that competitive-first mindset and all that this school has brought me, it\u2019s been unreal, and they really helped me find my game and develop me not just as a player but a person as well.\u201d<\/p>\n
There\u2019s no doubt his development blossomed after transferring to Michigan State after two tough seasons at Wisconsin and playing for a coach he had familiarity with from the U.S. National Team Development Program, Adam Nightingale.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think just finding my true identity as a power forward, a 200-foot center that can play up and down the ice and really just mature my game,\u201d he said. \u201cI feel like I got faster, got bigger, got stronger.<\/p>\n
\u201cLearned a lot about myself, and I\u2019m pumped to make the jump to the pro level here in the coming year.\u201d<\/p>\n
Stramel could have become an unrestricted free agent Aug. 15 if he hadn\u2019t signed with the team. That\u2019s what 2018 third-round pick Jack McBain threatened to do in 2022, though the Wild at least parlayed McBain into a second-round pick in a trade with Arizona.<\/p>\n
Stramel told The Athletic in January, though, that he planned to sign with the Wild after his college career \u2014 not test free agency. He stuck with that decision and didn\u2019t change his mind after his name was in trade rumors before the March 6 trade deadline \u2014 and knowing it surely will be again this offseason.<\/p>\n
If he signed elsewhere, he would have picked his landing spot. If he\u2019s traded, he won\u2019t have that chance.<\/p>\n
Now, make no mistake, the Wild don\u2019t want to trade him and aren\u2019t looking to. But if they go big-game hunting this offseason for a star like Jack Hughes, Nico Hischier, Auston Matthews, Brady Tkachuk, Dylan Larkin or Robert Thomas, the reality is that Stramel\u2019s their best non-NHL prospect, so his name will naturally come up.<\/p>\n
\u201cEnd of the day, when the rumors were going on around the deadline, I can\u2019t really control any of that,\u201d Stramel said. \u201cAt that point in time, I was just focused on continuing to try and play great hockey and help my team get to a national championship.<\/p>\n
\u201cObviously, the rumors happen. They happen all the time. But that\u2019s a part of the business. \u2026 So I\u2019m just kind of staying in my lane right now, trying to do what I can to rehab and be ready to go for training camp.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Rosemount, Minn., native, whose sister, Sophie, plays hockey at Minnesota State, just hopes that training camp comes here in Minnesota.<\/p>\n
\u201cGrowing up a fan my whole life, and then being able to get drafted to them and now signed to them, it\u2019s just unbelievable,\u201d he said. \u201cIt was truly a dream come true. And I\u2019m looking forward to the opportunity to hopefully throw the jersey on here.\u201d<\/p>\n
In the meantime, Stramel will stay in East Lansing for the next three weeks as he completes his degree in communications. Then, he\u2019ll return home to Minnesota to continue his rehab and train at the Wild\u2019s practice facility. He\u2019s hoping the Wild will still be alive in the postseason so he can root on his favorite team as a kid in the playoffs and envision himself on the same sheet of ice at Grand Casino Arena in the near future.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m pumped,\u201d the former fan of Wild players Zach Parise, Mikko Koivu and Ryan Suter said. \u201cA goal of mine is to crack the roster. But at the end of the day, I\u2019ve just got to go out there and play my game and do whatever I can to help the organization win games. So that\u2019s my goal.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ST. PAUL, Minn. \u2014 Charlie Stramel has blocked so many shots in his life, just imagine his disappointment…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":571730,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[66],"tags":[2662,7560,4828,385,99],"class_list":{"0":"post-571729","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nhl","8":"tag-college-sports","9":"tag-michigan-state-spartans","10":"tag-minnesota-wild","11":"tag-nhl","12":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/571729","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=571729"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/571729\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/571730"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=571729"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=571729"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=571729"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}