EVERETT — They call out to him as he leaves the ice and waddles back to the Everett Silvertips’ locker room in his oversized goaltender pads and skates. Season-ticket holders want to shake his hand. Children thrust programs and posters for him to sign, and Carter Hart happily obliges.
They all want a piece, a memento of this brush with 17-year-old greatness.
“Last year it was a little weird with people wanting my autograph,” Hart said. “But you get used to it. It’s fun for the fans and it’s fun for you, too.”
Hart has been a fan favorite at Xfinity Arena since bursting onto the ice and the Western Hockey League last season as a 16-year-old. He led the WHL in goals against average and propelled the Tips to their first U.S. Division title and playoff series win in eight years.
All he has done is win, but as Everett head coach Kevin Constantine says, in the Silvertips’ organization “win” stands for “What’s important next.”
For Hart and the Silvertips, that means leaving last year behind and focusing on the task ahead of them.
Forward turned goalie
At first, Hart did not want to play goaltender. The Sherwood Park, Alberta, native wanted to be a forward like his father, John, who skated collegiately at Northern Alberta Institute of Technology.
And a forward the younger Hart was, until age 9 when his novice team’s regular goaltender was gone and Hart volunteered to take his spot.
“I started to love the position and as the season went on, they started throwing it at me a couple more times,” Hart said. “The next season, when I was 10, I strapped on the pads for the whole season and that’s where we are today.”
His father’s first reaction to his son’s position change? “No.”
“He didn’t want to have to deal with the stress of a goalie,” Carter said. “But he was OK with it in the long run, and he’s happy with how it turned out.”
Hart advanced through the bantam and midget hockey ranks and was Everett’s eighth-round selection in the 2013 bantam draft. He played in two WHL games as a 15-year-old for Everett.
That was enough to open some eyes.
“We liked what we saw there,” Constantine said. “If he hadn’t played as a 15-year-old maybe (his) 16-year-old (season) would have been a surprise. But the way he played as 15-year-old gave us pretty good hope and confidence that he might be a pretty good goalie at a pretty young age.”
Yet no one could have expected what was to come.
Precocious talent
With the Silvertips’ No. 1 goaltender, Austin Lotz, away at NHL camp and Nik Amundrud about to be traded, Hart was tapped to start the 2014-15 season opener against archrival Seattle.
“I found out that morning,” Hart said. “I had to prepare just like any other game and went out there and just worried about stopping the puck, and that’s it.”
Hart stopped every puck shot his way as he recorded 26 saves and earned the shutout in Everett’s 1-0 victory. He emerged as the starter part way through the year and finished with a record of 18-5-2-3 with a league-leading 2.29 goals against average and a .915 save percentage.
The league began to take notice. Hart was named Candaian Hockey Goaltender of the Week in March. He’s since appeared on various prospect lists as a potential high NHL draft pick in 2016.
In the postseason, he was even better with a 2.28 GAA and a .929 save percentage. He helped the Tips knock off Spokane in the first round — Everett’s first playoff series win since 2007.
“I think when you’re a starter in the Western Hockey League as young as he was, people are going to notice because it’s a rare thing,” said Shane Clifford, Everett’s goaltending coach. “Not only did he start, but he won our first playoff round for us in eight years. So if people don’t know who you are, they will now.”
Hart’s youth is what really stands out. Constantine, a former net-minder himself, said goalies are the last group of hockey players that “mature into their profession.”
“You can find lots of goalies that make it that spend time in the (professional) East Coast League and they don’t arrive in the NHL until they’re 24 or 25,” Constantine said. “It’s clearly the position that takes the most to become efficient at. So it’s just highly unusual for a 16-year-old and that’s what was impressive.”
Hart’s development continued during the summer. He attended Hockey Canada’s 10th annual Program of Excellence goaltending camp, which took place June 12-14 in Toronto, Ontario.
“It was a lot of fun in Toronto just training and practicing with the best goalies across Canada,” Hart said. “It really helps your game, improves your game, especially working with some of the instructors out there that are world class.”
He was also one of 12 WHL players named to Canada’s U-18 Team that played at the Ivan Hlinka Memorial Tournament in the Czech Republic and Slovakia in August.
Blocking vs. reacting
Conventional wisdom says hockey goaltenders are either blockers or reactors. So which is Hart?
“I’d probably say a mix of both,” he said.
Clifford agreed.
“He knows his blocking zones and his reacting zones, and he does both,” Clifford said. “He knows those areas on the ice. He’s definitely a hybrid. He’ll do both, block or react, whatever he needs to do. The key is that as young as he is, he understands why he does what he does.”
As with many young athletes, consistency is a challenge and an area where Hart can improve. It can be difficult to maintain a level of excellence in every practice session and in every contest over the course of the 72-game WHL season.
That is where being a professional comes in and that is where many believe Hart is headed.
“I think the ceiling for him is the NHL, no question about that,” Clifford said. “He has fun with the things he does, but at the end of the day, he wants to end up being a pro, and he’s on his way.”
Craig Button of Canada’s The Sports Network has Hart ranked 41st on his NHL September prospect list. Draftsite.com has him going in the third round next year.
But just as players don’t want to get stuck looking back, looking forward can also be fraught with peril. Lotz is still with the organization as is Mario Petit, an 18-year-old who has been impressive in the preseason.
“We live in a profession of ‘What have you done for me lately?’” Constantine said. “The challenge for Carter is going to be that despite how grateful we are for what he did and how amazing last year was, we have to put that on the shelf now, too, and get prepared for now.”
When the puck drops Friday at Prince George “now” will be here. And that is what’s important next.
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