Well, I got to see Cody Eakin in action myself this weekend, as I headed up to Hershey for the Bears' last home game of the regular season. I'd heard from Hershey friend Derek that Cody didn't have such a great game on Saturday night against the Crunch, but I was hoping he'd still see action in the lineup on Sunday. Did he ever.
At the end of the night, Eakin was awarded the #2 star of the evening (#3 being
Patrick Wellar and #1 being
Mathieu Perreault). For the most part, the scouting reports I read were very correct. While I didn't really get to see the extent of his speed in action, I did notice that he is very good at seeing the ice. Just watching him during a particular shift, I saw that his eyes were constantly moving (literally darting around), even when the puck was nowhere near him - looking around the ice to see where the puck was, where his teammates were, where his opponents were.
He could see the next play before it even happened. This kind of ability will no doubt prove to be important and extremely beneficial to Eakin and his team.
His #2 star came from his beauty of a goal in the second period. As Cody was providing a screen in front of the net, Patrick Wellar launched a slapshot from the blue line, and Eakin angled his stick to deflect the shot past Admirals goalie Tokarski's shoulder for a goal. Aside from the goal, Eakin had a good game - creating scoring chances and establishing a decent forecheck. I can't wait to see him continue to improve, get stronger (at 179 lbs, he's still mighty scrawny for a 5'11" hockey player), and one day make it up to the Capitals roster.
Highlights of Sunday's game are here. Patrick Wellar's shot that Eakin deflects in comes at about the 0:22 mark.
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