What Colton Point learned from a gold-medal winning experience at the World Junior Hockey Championship, he has immediately put to use in building on his own monster season.
The 19-year-old goaltender from North Bay had little time to celebrate after Canada won gold on Jan. 5 in Buffalo. The next night, Point was in an NCAA net putting up a 37-save shutout for his Colgate Raiders against the Princeton Tigers.
Technically, it was Point’s second straight shutout – he blanked Slovakia 6-0 on Dec. 28 in his lone game for Canada in the world junior round robin. The professionalism he learned to carry himself with for three weeks as a member of Team Canada carried right over to his responsibilities at Colgate.
“I haven’t really had much time to take it all in. I had my night, but then I came back here and played the next day and had to jump right back in to Colgate hockey,” Point said in a telephone interview. “That’s how it is in season – sometimes you have to save some celebrating and some feel-good stuff for after the season when you have more time.”
The 2016 fifth-round pick of the NHL’s Dallas Stars played his way on to Canada’s roster with a strong showing in December’s selection camp, an invitation he earned based on his monster sophomore season at Colgate. He was the first NCAA goalie to make Canada’s world junior roster since David LeNeveu in 2003.
Point’s ascension in joining the junior hockey world’s elite has come quickly – he was a midget ‘AAA’ Trappers goalie in 2014-15 before a stellar 2015-16 junior ‘A season in Carleton Place helped him land at Colgate – so the international experience on the big stage was eye-opening.
“They (Hockey Canada) expect big things out of you and the whole country expects it and you have to be a professional and deal with the pressure and approach every day with a mindset that you have to give it all you have,” Point said. “The tournament is a grind, both physically and mentally. They ask a lot of you – you’re always on the go and you don’t get much downtime, so it’s really about professionalism and treating hockey like your job.
“Obviously, it’s an honour and it was a dream of mine to win a gold medal, but I still have responsibilities here at school to my teammates, my classmates and my coaching staff and if it means postponing a celebration, I’m glad to hold off and try to finish off our season strong and then go celebrate.”
That focus on the task at hand and the intensity he brings every time on the ice is serving him well. In his second season at Colgate, where he is an Education major, the former Chippewa Secondary School student has established himself as one of the top goalies in college hockey, sitting third in the entire NCAA with a .941 save percentage in 22 games, along with a 1.89 goals-against average and three shutouts. He was selected as Colgate’s nominee for the Hobey Baker Award, with the final 10 of the 74 nominees to be determined by online fan voting.
Point has been working the past couple offseasons with PRO Goaltending coach Mike Lawrence (who also mentors fellow North Bay goaltender Ken Appleby of the NHL’s New Jersey Devils). Colgate assistant coach Juliano Pagliero, a former pro goalie, is also helping Point refine his game on a daily basis.
“You can never be the perfect goalie, so I’ve been trying to work on my footwork, making transitions smoother, my general focus throughout a game and trying not to let a weak one in,” said Point, who also keeps in touch with his former ‘AAA’ Trappers goalie coach Kyle Aubut. “I’m really focusing on puck-tracking in practice and making sure I’m never taking a play off.”
Point says he has always been “hyper-focused” on puck-tracking, and is finding ways to improve by paying attention to small details like how a player is holding his stick or the position of the player’s hands or feet.
“That’s a big thing now, the body language of a shooter, or whether a guy is going to pass or shoot,” he said. “The game is so fast now, it’s impossible to simply react to the play – you have to anticipate a little bit. With good puck-tracking, it allows you to focus on other things, too.”
At Colgate, where the Raiders are struggling to score goals, it is up to Point to keep his team in virtually every game (Colgate has a 6-6-1 record in the ECAC conference). With a short 36-game schedule, and his role paramount to the team’s success, it allows Point to mentally approach every outing as if it’s a playoff game. Continuing to thrive and handle the pressure in that environment may bode well for his long-term objective.
“Obviously, eventually getting to the NHL is the end goal,” Point said. “I think for everybody playing hockey, that’s how it is. In the end, I think graduating is important to me. If Dallas comes calling, then I’d have to make a decision, but as of now, graduating is the plan and then after that, hopefully, I can make the jump to pro and keep growing my game and taking strides every year and keep trying to push for an NHL spot.”
