Three years ago, Anthony Romani was passed up in the 2023 NHL Draft. Two years ago, after getting picked with the 162nd pick of the 2024 NHL Draft by the Vancouver Canucks, he broke his clavicle just six games into his final season of junior hockey.<\/p>\n
In between, he led the OHL in goals (58), finished second in points (111), was a CHL Second All-Star and earned an invite to Canada\u2019s World Junior Summer Showcase as an 18-year-old.<\/p>\n
Now 21, he\u2019s entering his sophomore year at Michigan State, and they think the Canucks might really have something in him.<\/p>\n
Last season, as a freshman in college, he registered 14 goals and 28 points in 37 games, finishing fifth on the Spartans in points and fourth in goals.<\/p>\n
Assistant coach Mike Townes was the first of Michigan State\u2019s staff to get eyes on him with North Bay and Barrie the year prior once he returned from his broken clavicle. He played just 35 regular-season games and registered just 35 points but led the Colts in scoring with 12 goals and 24 points in 16 postseason games, including a point in all 16. The clavicle wasn\u2019t the only major injury he dealt with, either. During that playoff run, he also played through a \u201creally bad high-ankle sprain\u201d that turned his first six weeks of offseason training into rehab.<\/p>\n
After Townes, Michigan State\u2019s associate coach Jared DeMichiel and head coach Adam Nightingale watched him. All three thought the 6-foot-1, 195-pound right-shot winger, even when he was unable to repeat his 58-goal, 111-point season due to the injuries, was a heady, smart player with natural offensive instincts.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe always felt he would be a catalyst offensively \u2014 ability to make a play, ability to finish,\u201d DeMichiel said. \u201cHe doesn\u2019t need much; he\u2019s got a heavy shot (and) sneaky-good release. He was a good two-way forward that had some pretty deadly offensive instincts.\u201d<\/p>\n
Once they got their hands on him, they quickly realized he was more than just an opportunistic scorer, too. Not only could he score on the flank on the power play, but he penalty killed by the end of the year and all of his teammates wanted to play with him at five-on-five.<\/p>\n
At season\u2019s end, they also felt he was even a little snakebitten, pointing to broken sticks, posts, crossbars and offside goals called back in making the case that he should\u2019ve had \u201ca few more.\u201d<\/p>\n
The first time Romani showed up to skate with Josh Wrobel, a skills and shooting coach, it was the summer of 2022. He\u2019d just finished his rookie season \u2014 a 14-point campaign \u2014 in the OHL.<\/p>\n
He and teammate Dalyn Wakely came together; they always come in a pair, according to Wrobel. At the time, he was undersized, but Wrobel recognized him as \u201cvery talented.\u201d As the numbers on the scale started to change, the numbers on the ice did too.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s cliche, but he\u2019s the definition of a late bloomer, and he really weaponized his shot,\u201d Wrobel said.<\/p>\n
Together, he and Wrobel worked on the little things that can turn someone into a shooter: timing, shot selection, shot placement, getting dangerous from different areas, even the toe on his curve and flex of his stick.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnytime he gets inside, he\u2019s a threat anytime the puck comes towards him,\u201d Wrobel said. \u201cHe\u2019s a natural goal scorer, and for me the hardest thing in hockey is to score goals.\u201d<\/p>\n
After a review of his scoring in the OHL revealed that the majority of his goals were either the half-wall power-play snipes he became known for or breakaways, Wrobel challenged him to \u201cgive me 6-8 ugly goals\u201d (tips, rebounds, net front) in his freshman year of college hockey.<\/p>\n
Romani delivered.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis year, it was really cool to see him have a handful of deflection goals or it\u2019s on and off, and he\u2019s finding locations and has those locations locked in before he gets the puck,\u201d Wrobel said. \u201cHe knows where he\u2019s going before it gets to him inside the dots.\u201d<\/p>\n
Wrobel has also seen the difference his work in the weight room, both at Michigan State and with his strength coach, Dan Noble, has made.<\/p>\n
\u201cHis strength has translated to his game where you saw him executing in different areas,\u201d Wrobel said.<\/p>\n
Noble, who owns Noble Sport Performance, has worked with Romani for five years now.<\/p>\n
When he first arrived in his gym, he was \u201cvery immature and really raw (and) hadn\u2019t really committed to the strength and conditioning piece.\u201d<\/p>\n
Working out with guys like Beckett Sennecke and Mitch Marner, \u201che was really able to take everything to another level,\u201d according to Noble.<\/p>\n
\u201cThose things kind of fell into place for him at the right time, understanding the amount of work that he wanted to put in,\u201d Noble said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe one thing that he was missing was kind of the strength and power side of things and just the overall acceleration and athleticism.\u201d<\/p>\n
After spending much of last season rehabbing his ankle, and much of the offseason before that at development camps and the World Junior Summer Showcase, Noble felt Romani\u2019s decision to choose fewer games and more time in the gym at college instead of making the jump from the OHL into being \u201ceaten alive on the bus and living out of a hotel in the AHL\u201d last season was the right one.<\/p>\n
\u201cComing back from (Michigan State), he\u2019s just at a different level altogether right now,\u201d Noble said.<\/p>\n
When Romani looks back on his road to this point, he chuckles.<\/p>\n
He was raised just east of Toronto in Pickering, where his mom is a teacher and his dad owns two The Burger\u2019s Priest restaurants. He\u2019s the oldest of three, and his younger sister is a gymnast.<\/p>\n
He feels like he has had to earn everything he has gotten in hockey after losing his final year of minor hockey entirely to the pandemic, the passing over in the draft and the injuries.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was always a question of \u2018What changed this year to last year?\u2019 A lot of it was motivation after going undrafted and making it my goal this year just to kind of prove what I am and what I\u2019m capable of,\u201d he said of his rapid development.<\/p>\n
He describes himself as a smart offensive forward whose strengths are his skill and hockey IQ.<\/p>\n
After working hard to fill out, his focus has turned to adding speed through his first few steps.<\/p>\n
And he\u2019s happy with his decision to go to college, calling it the \u201cobvious choice\u201d for him \u2014 and Michigan State the obvious school, largely because of their strength and sports science guru Will Morlock and the individualized plan he put in place for him.<\/p>\n
\u201cBecause I was injured last year, I had a lot of time to think about (college). It felt like a step towards pro,\u201d Romani said. \u201cIt has been great to be able to play against older players, push the pace and play at a higher level.\u201d<\/p>\n
Now back to feeling fully healthy again, he\u2019s also eager to go earn that next thing: an entry-level contract with the Canucks.<\/p>\n
Michigan State\u2019s staff, Noble and Wrobel are betting on it, too.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re pumped for him to take another step next season,\u201d DeMichiel said.<\/p>\n
\u2014 With reporting in East Lansing, Mich.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Three years ago, Anthony Romani was passed up in the 2023 NHL Draft. Two years ago, after getting…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":791349,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[66],"tags":[385,99,1320],"class_list":["post-791348","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-nhl","tag-sports","tag-vancouver-canucks"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/791348","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=791348"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/791348\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/791349"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=791348"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=791348"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=791348"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}