The NHL season is nearing, and training camps are underway for all of the league’s 32 teams. The New York Islanders started camp with a roster of 57 players, including some of their 2021 NHL Draft picks, out of those 57 players, the Islanders have seven goaltenders on their training camp roster, one of them being 2021 third-round selection, Tristan Lennox.

Lennox, 18, was born on October 21, 2002, in Mississauga, Ontario. He played for his hometown Mississauga Reps Minor Midget team during the 2017-18 season, while also appearing in the OHL Cup, finishing with a 1.91 goals against average and a .915 save percentage. He was the first goaltender taken in the 2018 Priority Selection Draft at 26th overall by the Saginaw Spirit. In April 2018, Lennox committed to the Spirit, and attended prospect camp, but split the season between Saginaw and Brantford 99ers of the OJHL.

In Saginaw, he went 7-2-2 with a 2.79 goals-against average, a .907 save percentage, and one shutout in 15 games, while going 4-7-0 record with a 3.74 goals-against average and a .918 save percentage in 11 games in Brantford. In seven playoff games for Saginaw, he went 2-4-0 with a 3.11 goals-against average and a .911 save percentage.

Lennox split the goaltending duties in 2019-20, playing in 33 games, he compiled a 20-8-3 record but struggled slightly with a 3.63 goals-against average, and a .876 save percentage. Obviously, he did not have a 2020-21 season due to the Coronavirus pandemic but was able to train and also spent some time with the AHL’s Toronto Marlies.

The Islanders drafted Tristan Lennox in the third round of the 2021 NHL Entry Draft with the 93rd overall pick. The 6’4″ Lennox will be able to work with the tandem of Islanders Goalie Coach, Piero Greco, and Director of Goaltending, Mitch Korn at a capacity that not many goaltenders have been able to do, and those who have, such as the current NHL tandem of Semyon Varlamov and Ilya Sorokin, have succeeded.

For a second opinion on Lennox, I once again reached out to Will Scouch. Scouch is a McKeen’s Hockey contributor and founder of Scouching, where he takes both aspects of the “eye test” and advanced analytics to give a different perspective on the game to fans, especially focusing on the draft. You can check out his scouting report on Cameron Berg, the Islanders’ fourth-round selection in my previous article, and Eetu Liukas, the Islanders’ fifth-round selection.

“Tristan Lennox is a tough one. He brings a solid history of stopping pucks at a 90%+ rate, except for 2019-20 behind a strong Saginaw team. That’s a bit of a red flag to me, but the Islanders have a famously strong goaltending coach in Mitch Korn who may have landed the elusive goaltender of the future they’ve been looking for that wasn’t developed overseas or signed for big money. I’ve always liked Lennox as a calm, confident, no-nonsense goaltender. His high and medium danger save percentages of 0.759 and 0.891 respectively going back to 2019-20 isn’t exactly earth-shattering, and digging into some of the tape, it seems like Lennox’s technical refinements navigating in the net with control seems to be a bit inconsistent, especially on secondary and tertiary shot attempts. Tracking pucks quicker, staying more square to the puck on lateral motion, and staying upright in close quarters seem to be areas for improvement that led to quite a few goals against.

There’s certainly a level of maturity with Lennox you often don’t see in junior goalies, and oftentimes, with years of development, if the athleticism and technical ability can improve consistently, there could easily be something there. Again, the wrench in the situation is that Lennox hasn’t played competitive games since March 2020, so my read could be completely inaccurate by this point, but welcome to 2020. Lennox is an October 2002 kid, nearly a 2020 eligible, so he’s a bit further along in his age curve, but he could be a nice buy-low candidate for the Islanders to stash away for the next few years.”

Despite being invited to the Islanders’ 2021 Training Camp, Tristan Lennox will likely start the year back in the OHL with Saginaw, and this will be a big year for his development.

SEF