Being back in the Twin Cities for the summer is nothing new for Minnesota Wild prospect Charlie Stramel. But this time, come September, he\u2019ll be working to stay.<\/p>\n
Stramel, 21, was the Wild\u2019s first-round pick in the 2023 draft and is a candidate to make his NHL debut in October when Minnesota\u2019s training camp concludes.<\/p>\n
In truth, if not for some bad luck in his final collegiate game, the Rosemount native might already have worn a Wild jersey during last season\u2019s playoffs.<\/p>\n
His final collegiate season at Michigan State was a breakout year. Playing for a talented Spartans team that won its third consecutive Big Ten Conference title, Stramel tied for the team lead in assists with 25. He made an impressive pairing with Porter Martone, who jumped right from college to the NHL, where he was a playoff sensation with the Philadelphia Flyers.<\/p>\n
Bad break vs. Badgers<\/p>\n
While Martone is the early betting favorite for NHL rookie of the year next season, Stramel suffered a devastating setback in March, which has him working his way back to health as the summer progresses.<\/p>\n
In an NCAA regional final against Wisconsin \u2014 where Stramel began his collegiate career before transferring to East Lansing for two seasons \u2014 the 6-foot-3 center blocked a Badgers shot and limped to the bench with what turned out to be a broken ankle. His college career was over, as was the Spartans\u2019 season a few hours later when Wisconsin won in overtime on their way to a national runner-up finish.<\/p>\n
When Stramel signed a three-year contract with the Wild a few days later, he was already talking about finishing his communications degree at Michigan State and getting his body back into shape as soon as he could shed the walking boot that was a part of his life in the late spring.<\/p>\n
When he met with the media at Wild development camp last week, Stramel walked into the interview at TRIA Rink without a boot or hint of a limp and told reporters it was a joy to wear skates for the first time in months.<\/p>\n
\u201cI just started on ice, but (have) been able to train in the gym for last month, month-and-a-half \u2014 since the season ended,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s been feeling good. Been making a ton of progress and feel like I\u2019m starting to get in great shape and excited to be able to push the ice here in a couple weeks.\u201d<\/p>\n
Successful switch<\/p>\n
After leaving his Minnesota hometown to play for Adam Nightingale at USA Hockey\u2019s National Team Development Program in Michigan, Stramel committed to play for Tony Granato in Madison. The big center did enough as a freshman to catch the Wild\u2019s eye and was the 21st overall pick in the draft three years ago.<\/p>\n
But Granato had been fired at Wisconsin a month or so before the draft and the Badgers replaced him with Mike Hastings, who had worked wonders at Minnesota State. For a variety of reasons, Stramel didn\u2019t fit in the Hastings system. In 34 games as a sophomore, he notched three goals and five assists and was deemed a bust by a hefty portion of the Wild fanbase.<\/p>\n
With Nightingale now coaching Michigan State, Stramel entered the transfer portal and transferred to East Lansing. But there was more to his resurgence than changing colors.<\/p>\n
\u201cCharlie put a ton of work in off the ice. He dropped his body fat percentage, he put on good muscle. \u2026 He\u2019s an unreal athlete,\u201d Spartans assistant coach Jared DeMichiel said. \u201cWe talked to him when he went into the portal and said, \u2018Just because you switch your jersey doesn\u2019t mean everything\u2019s gonna be OK and everything\u2019s gonna be perfect. You\u2019ve gotta commit yourself.\u2019 And he looked himself in the mirror and knew he needed to be better.\u201d<\/p>\n
Playing with Martone as a senior, and with Hobey Baker Award winner Isaac Howard as a junior, helped. But Stramel proved to be significantly more than just a good linemate. Using his size and skill, Stramel earned All-Big Ten first-team honors and was named one of the 10 finalists for the Hobey Baker last season.<\/p>\n
By season\u2019s end, the first-round-bust label was gone.<\/p>\n
\u201cOn the ice, he is uber competitive. I think he\u2019s sneaky creative, and for us he just grew where he took a ton of pride in his play without the puck,\u201d DeMichiel said. \u201cWith the puck, he could just play all situations and was detailed, but (he) also led to a ton of offense.\u201d<\/p>\n
Debut delayed<\/p>\n
Had he been healthy when the Wild started the playoffs, it\u2019s realistic to think that Stramel would have gotten into a game or two, especially when second-line center Joel Eriksson-Ek was lost to injury and unavailable for Round 2 versus Colorado.<\/p>\n
Now, a healthy Stramel will stay home in September to compete for a roster spot on a team on the upswing, and perpetually in need of centers that can dominate in the faceoff circle and in front of the net. That is assuming that his career doesn\u2019t take Stramel back to Michigan via a trade.<\/p>\n
With the rumors of the Wild dealing for Red Wings center Dylan Larkin swirling, Stramel has been mentioned as a prospect that could be part of a deal. He said last week he\u2019s trying to focus on what he can control, but he acknowledged that it\u2019s difficult.<\/p>\n
\u201cI try not to buy into much of that, even the social media stuff in general,\u201d Stramel said. \u201cYeah, if it\u2019s gonna be out there. You\u2019re gonna see it even though you don\u2019t want to, but do what you gotta do. There\u2019s nothing really I can control, except keep training and get ready to go for the season.\u201d<\/p>\n
He was unavailable on the ice, but Stramel still traveled with the team he had cheered for as a child, and he found an even deeper hunger to be a part of future success in Minnesota.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was pretty cool to see,\u201d he said of the playoffs. \u201cObviously, not the end goal for them, but it was pretty cool to see some of the games and \u2026 be a supporter. I mean, I\u2019ve been a fan of this team my whole life, so to see them make a run this year was pretty cool. And I hope to help that out in the future.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Being back in the Twin Cities for the summer is nothing new for Minnesota Wild prospect Charlie Stramel.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":619545,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5118],"tags":[9684,28630,5,3119,161,38,5280,285,1355,4,701,32448,162,9682],"class_list":["post-619544","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-minnesota-wild","tag-big-ten-conference","tag-charlie-stramel","tag-hockey","tag-michigan-state-spartans","tag-minnesota","tag-minnesota-wild","tag-minnesotawild","tag-national-hockey-league","tag-national-hockey-league-teams","tag-nhl","tag-porter-martone","tag-tony-granato","tag-wild","tag-wisconsin-badgers-football"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116896837349501469","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/619544","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=619544"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/619544\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/619545"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=619544"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=619544"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=619544"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}