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Philadelphia Flyers prospect Denver Barkey had a breakout game in the AHL and it was so impressive.
There is no other prospect in the Philadelphia Flyers system that needed to show that they belonged than Denver Barkey. The winger with all the motor in the world was able to play a prominent role on a dominant London Knights team in the OHL, but that was junior hockey. Barkey needed to make himself known within the first few weeks of turning pro and lacing up for the Lehigh Valley Phantoms.
There were questions coming into this year. We have seen it so often that a player with Barkey’s 5-foot-9 frame disappears as soon as they take on the next level. In juniors, they were given so much more time and space to be able to create their offense and rack up the point total that made fans consider him a top prospect. And then just months after they graduate and experience their last junior season where they were older than everyone in the league — as they made 16 year olds look poor defensively for all of their points — they’re nowhere to be found and struggle immediately.
Well, thankfully Denver Barkey is not that type of player.
He sure did have a fantastic junior career in London, capped off with winning the Memorial Cup last spring, and there were concerns that due to his size that it would take a few months or even the entire season for him to become acclimated to the AHL and professional hockey in general. In this wait-and-see moment, fans of Barkey were confident that he could at least show more of his true self throughout the season — an incredibly smart player that is tenacious in all three zones and a motor that doesn’t quit — but not even his biggest fans saw a performance like he had for the Phantoms on Wednesday night come so early in the season.
The Phantoms visited the Bridgeport Islanders in what resulted as a dominant 6-2 win over their divisional rivals to earn an impressive 7-3-0-1 start to their season but the true star of the game had to be Barkey. With one goal and three assists, the 20-year-old winger had his most productive game of the season but it went beyond just the points and how much he got involved in the offense.
For a few games now, Barkey has linked up with fellow prospect Alex Bump on the first line and has been putting the work in to eventually earn a night like this.
While it’s not the most impressive display of his skill, for his goal Wednesday night, Barkey perfectly used his elusiveness to cut in behind the defense and newcomer defenseman Christian Kyrou made a well-timed pass for the winger to have a 1-on-1 chance that he buried.
Too smooth 🧊#LVvsBRI | #LVPhantoms pic.twitter.com/4UFDdNRPOL
Again, not the most impressive play that makes you think we suddenly have one of the best young players in the world on our hands, but Barkey has the confidence and poise to do exactly this. It helps that the team already had the lead, but the Islanders could have easily come back with a lucky goal.
What was a much more impressive play and somewhat summarizes Barkey’s entire approach to the game was his assist on Lane Pederson’s third-period goal that put the Phantoms up 5-2. On this play, Bump throws a somewhat blind backhand pass into the slot (knowing that Barkey will most likely be there) but it hits a Bridgeport defender. The puck is then pounced on by Barkey but instead of making the most likely and expected play, he creates an entire goal off of his stick by deceiving multiple Islanders.
One more!#LVvsBRI | #LVPhantoms pic.twitter.com/poSZtdQxgB
It’s just quintessential smart offensive hockey by a very smart and offensive hockey player. Barkey grabs the puck deep in the slot in an area where roughly 90 percent of forwards would go for a quick shot — but instead within milliseconds, Barkey reads the defense prepping for the shot, the goaltender biting on it and making his net as open as possible for the waiting Pederson in the left faceoff circle.
It’s just so dang impressive how quickly Barkey was able to turn what was most likely going to maybe result in a shot on goal, into one of the easiest goals that Pederson will score in his career. The amount of high-end offensive processing that a player would need to read that situation and make that is outstanding. The Bridgeport netminder doesn’t even make it obvious, but he plays the shot and bites on Barkey in the slot — coming out to the edge of his crease and being more aggressive than he should be.
It’s not clear if Barkey even had the time to read that but he knew all along that deception was his motivation. The way that the 20-year-old approaches the loose puck with his stick on the ice, bending over as if he is going to try to wire it into the back of the net and then swiftly sending it over to Pederson the moment multiple opposing players commit to him taking the shot. It’s just perfect and so impressive. It’s the stuff you see from the very best and here those instincts lie in a 5-foot-9 third-round pick from Newmarket, Ontario.
Size was always going to be the major hurdle for Barkey to really carve out an NHL career, but there are so many early signs of him potentially overcoming his frame just over a dozen games into his pro career. With the Knights, Barkey displayed his relentless pursuit of possession and that’s what made scouts fall in love, but there were still question marks and that is what caused him to drop. But now? We can guarantee many teams are kicking themselves for not taking a chance on him with their second or third selection of the day.
Now we just enjoy the ride of the development of an exciting young talent and see where this high-end hockey sense can take Barkey.
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