Stefan Elliott has seen his interesting, up and down run with the Colorado Avalanche come to an end. Elliott was a big defensive prospect for the Avs coming out of the draft, touted for his offensive talent and hidden defensive game. After 4 seasons with the Avalanche, where Elliott played only 63 regular season games and no playoff games because the Avs don’t believe in playoffs apparently. When Elliott was called up, he played an average game. He showed flashed of offensive brilliance and defensive prowess, as well as some defensive flaws. But, to quote the age old adage, defenseman take longer to develop. It is weird though, that even when he played well he seemed to not crack the coach’s lineup. Both Roy and Sacco. Was it Tyson Barrie’s rise to stardom that slowed him down in the depth chart? Did his development stall? Whatever the reason, he will be missed.
There is a dark undertone to Elliott, however. Here is a true story about one of Elliott’s past encounters with a Major Junior team.
The Prince George Cougars, a Major Junior hockey team out of the WHL, were a struggling franchise that was in the process of starting a rebuild. They managed to snag the 12th overall pick in the Bantam Draft and used the pick on a promising young defenseman out of Vancouver in the BC Major Midget league. That pick was Stefan Elliott.
This situation was golden for Elliott. Here he is drafted by a team with a young, inexperienced defense aside from Dustin Byfuglien, which screams ice time and opportunity. But what Elliott did, with the help from his parents, was inexcusable to the Prince George hockey fans.
Elliott refused to report to the team’s training camp the following year and refused to play a single game for them. Can you feel the Eric Lindros vibe? Elliott claimed his reasons were the plight of the Cougars franchise, and the long travel hours. (The Cougars roughly have the longest travel schedule of any WHL team as they are the northern most team, 6 hours away from any away game. On the bus. Oh junior hockey.) He also cited the city itself as not being a desirable place to live. Any other Bantam player should have jumped at an opportunity for tons of ice time, and even a place to play in Major Junior, the top junior competition in Canada, and arguably the world. This forced the Cougars to trade a top notch prospect to the Saskatoon (oh Canadian City names) Blades. Yea, they got Devin Setoguchi out of the deal, but he only played 1 season for the Cougars, while the Blades got 4 years out of Elliott, stellar defensive play, and a few deep playoff runs and a first place finish.
Bottom line: He disappointed the fans of Prince George, crapped on the city and team, and set back their rebuild by more than a few seasons.
He will be missed though, and it is very unfortunate he never lived up to his potential. Good luck in the desert and then Seattle.
By the way we had too look up what the correct spelling of desert. The English language sucks sometimes. And we got it wrong the first time.
