Source: Jakub Homoľa - http://www.slovakprospects.com/

Article by: Jakub Homol'a

Perhaps no other Slovak player who was drafted in this year CHL Import draft, doesn’t have such a good reputation as Patrik Koyš. Patrik, 16, native of Dubnica, has already been honored with the title of Slovak Sidney Crosby by Canadian medias and even though it seems he won’t play overseas next season, many teams from three most prestigious junior leagues were interested in picking him.

These all things resulted in picking him by Shawinigan Cataractes with their 25th overall pick. “I’m satisfied with the team because it is a defending Memorial Cup champion,” Patrik Koyš describes in one sentence but eloquently his feelings. “But I do not know whether they had interest during the season. I have never talked about that with my agent,” Koyš answered the question where Shawinigan was in touch with him or his agent during the last season.
 

Whereas many drafted Slovaks are still not sure about going overseas next season or they are decided to try it, Koyš is an exception. “Currently, I do not know whether I will go to Canada or not. Most likely not, but everything is possible. I’ve begun summer practice with the senior team of Dukla Trenčín where I will stay as yet,” Koyš said.

Conversely, on the other side of the Atlantic, they hope Patrik will change his decision till the beginning of next season. “We had lots of talk with us and his agent. We want to meet him and his parents in August at our training camp,” Martin Mondou, Cataractes general manager, said for SlovakProspects.com

No wonder, Koyš was the top priority for Shawinigan prior the draft. “Patrik was the player, we desperately wanted. For us, he was the top euro pick this year. We even tried to move up in draft order to be sure that we would pick him, but we were not able to trade for a better pick than 25th overall,” Mondou said.

“We won the Memorial Cup last season and we have young team prior the next season. Patrik is a player we really like to this group and we think he will make us better and we hope we will be able to win Memorial Cup again in two or three season from today,” Mondou explains the reason why they decided to pick Koyš.

Mondou clearly expressed a huge interest in Koyš. GM promises him that the team will give him a significant time on the ice. “100 per cent. He’s player for our future, we want to give him an opportunity to play like Saint John did with Tomáš Jurčo in his first season overseas. He will have a chance to play a lot, we count on him especially on our top two line with our best veteran, where he will be given an offensive tasks,” Mondou outlined plans.

Many experts worried whether player from Dukla Trenčín wouldn’t be limited by his size in Canada. Shawinigan general manager does not think so. “Not at all. QMJHL is probably the best league for those type of players,” Mondou said and he continued, “Daniel Brière, David Desharnais, Mike Ribeiro are great examples that players of same height as Patrik, can bring the quality to the team and they can achieve many success in QMJHL and later in NHL.”