In the Islanders’ perfect world, Samuel Bolduc would break into the starting lineup from opening night onwards.
As much as the organization was encouraged by Sebastian Aho putting together his best season in 2022-23, and as much as the Swede represents a perfectly serviceable player on the third pair, he will enter training camp as a hurdle for Bolduc to clear rather than someone entrenched in the lineup.
With the other five spots on the blue line set in stone, it will be the second straight year that Aho has had to battle for a job in camp, and Bolduc may be tougher competition than Robin Salo, Grant Hutton and Dennis Cholowski posed last year.
Aho, remember, did not win that competition outright.
Salo played the season’s first four games alongside Scott Mayfield before Aho was inserted into the lineup, going on to play 71 games and become a mainstay.
It was a true reversal of fortune for the 27-year-old, whose game had been plagued by inconsistency in the past and who looked like he would spend a career yo-yoing between the AHL and NHL.
“I was a lot more consistent than I’ve been the years prior to this,” Aho said on breakup day. “I feel like I’ve always had good games every year, but I’ve also had a lot of worse games. I feel like this year I stayed at a better level throughout everything and I’m happy with that.”
Finding another level to his game six years after being drafted is a real achievement, and at least as relates to the start of the season, it should give Aho a leg up on the starting job going into camp.
Bolduc, however, is the closest thing the organization has to an NHL-ready prospect and should step into a full-time role in 2024-25 at the latest, with Aho becoming an unrestricted free agent after this season.
In 17 games last season, Bolduc flashed some real talent and, mostly, played with poise.
Naturally, there were times where he got caught out of position by turnovers or mental errors, but that is how it goes for most rookie defensemen in the league.
For now, it’s part of the learning process.
The Islanders have the luxury of not needing to force Bolduc into a role for which he is not ready.
Aho has a similar skill set, as both are puck-moving defensemen who could get a shot running the power play.
But the 6-foot-4, 220-pound Bolduc is bigger, with the potential to play a much more physical game than Aho, who is relatively small for an NHL defenseman.
And the Quebecois’ ceiling is still unknown, and thus tantalizing.
Noah Dobson, the most recent highly touted defense prospect to break into the lineup, required a year-plus of seasoning before then-coach Barry Trotz began plugging him in on a nightly basis.
By the end of the 2021 season, though, he was a staple, and played in all 19 postseason games as a bottom-pair defenseman.
On the other end of the spectrum, Salo was given a few call-ups during the 2021-22 season, when the Islanders were clearly in need of someone to fill a mobility void on defense and never left much of an impression.
When he did finally win a job last training camp, he lost it in short order and has found himself on the wrong end of the organizational depth chart going into a contract year.
Realistically, Bolduc will end up somewhere between those two extremes.
The quicker he can force his way into an everyday role, though, the better.
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