Vancouver Canucks forward prospect Gabriel Chiarot grew up a Dustin Byfuglien fan.
Byfuglien’s name may still be cringeworthy for some Canuck supporters, considering the way he treated Roberto Luongo as his personal crash pad back in the days of the Vancouver’s rowdy rivalry with the Chicago Blackhawks: It also offers up a hint in the kind of rugged, robust game Chiarot wants to play.
Chiarot plays it well enough that the Canucks used a sixth-round pick (No. 175 overall) on him in last summer’s NHL Draft, and well enough that they signed him to his entry-level contract after training camp came to a close in September.
It’s unusual that someone drafted that late signs his contract that early. An even bigger statement on what he might be capable of came in late December, when the Kitchener Rangers traded eight OHL Draft selections and the rights to University of Michigan forward Adam Valentini to land Chiarot from the Brampton Steelheads.
Kitchener (28-11-3-1) is making a championship run this season. They currently sit second in the OHL’s Western Conference.
The 5-foot-11, 191-pound Chiarot posted 21 goals and 35 points in 66 games with Brampton last season and has 17 goals and 28 points in 39 games between the Steelheads and Rangers in the current campaign. But he’s not someone you are going to judge strictly by numbers.
“The Canucks had already invited me to their development camp if I didn’t end up getting picked, so I knew that they were interested before the draft,” said Chiarot, 19. “There were a few other teams that I talked to, so I wasn’t quite sure how things might work out, but obviously I’m happy now.
“They told me at the start of the year to just keep playing my game, because that’s why they signed me. They told me not to focus too much on production and how many points I’m getting, as long as I’m playing the way I can, which is being that power forward. That’s what they want me to do.
“All the staff that I’ve talked to have been excited about the trade and the kind of experience I can have playing (in Kitchener).”
Chiarot says that Byfuglien was “so fun to watch with the big hits he’d make and the goals he’d score.”
Byfuglien, now 40 and out of hockey since 2018-19, played the final eight years of his NHL career with the Winnipeg Jets, and his teammates there included defenceman Ben Chiarot, who’s the Canucks’ prospect’s cousin.
Ben is 34 and currently in his 13th NHL season, playing for the Detroit Red Wings. He was a fourth-round pick of the Atlanta Thrashers in 2009 and played parts of four seasons in the minors before becoming an NHL regular, so he has worked his way up the system.
Gabriel says he calls on Ben for advice regularly. They skate together in the summers as part of a group that regularly includes former Canuck Tanner Pearson and Logan Stanley.
“Ben was in kind of the same boat as me. He was a fourth-rounder, and wasn’t considered a high prospect when he started,” Gabriel says. “He played in the East Coast and the AHL before he found a home in the NHL, and ever since then he has stuck. He’s got a pretty good story behind him. It’s always encouraging to hear about what he’s done. It motivates me.
“He’s someone who has been there and done it, and he’s still doing it. It’s nice to be able to lean on him about things and see what he has to say. Any questions I have he is able to help me, and training with him in the summers I’m able to see the lifestyle of a pro.”
Chiarot says that his agent called him the day of the Rangers trade to tell him that he could be dealt sometime in that next week. Two hours later, he heard from Brampton GM/coach James Richmond that he was going to Kitchener. The Steelheads (13-25-3-2), who are ninth in the 10-team Eastern Conference, received two second-round selections in 2027 and 2028 to highlight the swap. The OHL has rules against trading first-round picks.
Kitchener associate coach and associate general manager Jeff Kyrzakos had the same roles with the Steelheads when Chiarot joined that team two seasons ago, and that undoubtedly played into the deal.
“It’s exciting for sure, but it’s also a little sad. I’ve played with some of the guys on Brampton for awhile now,” Chiarot said. “It sucks to leave them, but it’s super exciting to join a contending team like Kitchener.”
Kitchener made a blockbuster deal just ahead of the OHL’s trade deadline earlier this month, bringing in Canada world junior team forward Sam O’Reilly and defenceman Jared Woolley from the London Knights for a player and 10 draft picks. O’Reilly, 19, was a 2024 Edmonton Oilers first rounder, while Woolley — who is 6-foot-5 and 215 pounds — was a Los Angeles Kings sixth rounder from that same draft.
The Rangers are clearly all-in at trying to win the OHL championship, and the Memorial Cup national championship tournament berth that accompanies it. The Memorial Cup is in Kelowna this spring, and Chiarot admits “it makes it even better that it’s on the West Coast,” considering his Canuck connections.
“We have to play heavy, fast and hard, and that’s what our team is built around,” Chiarot said in regards to what the Rangers need to do to have success the rest of the way.
Sixth-round picks remain long shots to make the NHL. There hasn’t be a sixth rounder from the 2024 or 2023 drafts suit up in an NHL game as of yet. There has been three from 2022 see duty, and two of those have played a single game. Dominic James, a centre out of the University of Minnesota-Duluth, went No. 173 overall, played 33 games with the Tampa Bay Lightning.
Goalie Arturs Silovs, who was drafted in 2019, was the last Canucks sixth rounder to see NHL games.
@SteveEwen