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SAN JOSE — Defenseman Mario Ferraro was a bit taken aback when it was relayed to him that Cale Makar, his former teammate at UMass-Amherst and a budding star with the Colorado Avalanche, called the Sharks prospect two months ago the “hardest working guy” he’s ever met.
“Well, first of all, thank you Cale for those kind words,” Ferraro said of the 2019 Hobey Baker Award winner. “I’m not surprised. He’s a really nice kid.”
The accolades for Ferraro have been rolling in at the Sharks’ development camp this week, as well, which continued with a scrimmage Wednesday under the watchful eye of the team’s staff, including general manager Doug Wilson and coach Pete DeBoer. The Sharks prospects will hold another scrimmage for the public Friday at SAP Center.
“One of the most high-energy guys you’ve ever seen,” Sharks director of scouting Doug Wilson Jr. said. “He does not have a bad day.”
“A ton of energy,” Barracuda coach Roy Sommer said. “He looks good. Especially early on in the scrimmage, I thought he kind of carried the play. Kind of a hard guy to play against. He’ll be fun. He’ll be fun to coach. Any one who comes to the rink with that much energy is a blessing.”
Ferraro, the Sharks’ second round draft pick in 2017, signed his entry-level contract April 29, two weeks after UMass lost the national championship game to Minnesota-Duluth at the Frozen Four in Buffalo, N.Y.
Ferraro and Makar were defense partners in their freshman year at UMass in 2017-18, when Ferraro had 23 points in 39 games, but were split this season as Ferraro took on a different, more defensive role. After he barely missed out on playing for Team Canada at the World Junior Championships, he finished his season at UMass with 14 points in 41 games.
“Maybe his numbers didn’t show it,” Makar told this newspaper in April when the Sharks were facing the Avalanche in their second round playoff series, “but he’s still a hell of a player.”
Barring injuries or an otherworldly training camp, Ferraro, 20, figures to start his first season as a pro with the Barracuda.
The Sharks already have Marc-Edouard Vlasic, Brenden Dillon, Radim Simek and Jacob Middleton on the left side, and only the most elite players, such as Makar, can make the jump straight from the NCAA into the NHL, particularly on defense.
Still, seeing what kind of impact Makar was able to make in just a few playoff games with the Avalanche gives Ferraro and John Leonard — the Sharks’ sixth round pick in 2018 who will be going back to UMass in the fall — some belief that they can make it here, as well.
“Just because you see how a player that we competed against every day in practice and compete with is doing really well,” Ferraro said. “You say, ‘Hey, maybe I can be that guy as well. I can play at the next level.’ So, it builds that confidence and it’s a nice thing to see how well he’s doing.”
Listed at 5-foot-11 and 185 pounds, Ferraro’s not the biggest blueliner in camp this week. His biggest attributes are his skating, puck moving ability, hockey sense and, of course, work ethic.
But he feels he can play a physical game as well, something that would no doubt be appreciated by DeBoer and assistant Bob Boughner, as he even took the body on a couple of occasions in a scrimmage that was, as expected, light on big hits.
“I like to be physical, I like to compete,” Ferraro said. “I feel I got us going out there a little bit. At the end of the day, it’s just a scrimmage, but you’ve got to compete. That’s what we’re here for. We’re in development camp. We’re trying to get better.”
United Nations Line
Center Sasha Chmelevski was on a line with Ivan Chekhovich and Lean Bergmann for Wednesday’s scrimmage. The three, all 20 years old, had some chemistry, and it wouldn’t come as a surprise to see the trio on the same line with the Barracuda in the fall.
Chmelevski, a Southern California native and an impact player for Team USA at the 2019 World Juniors, and the Russian-born Chekhovich were already familiar with each other, having played on the same line with the Barracuda on its run to the Western Conference finals of the 2017 Calder Cup playoffs.
Bergmann, who the Sharks signed as a free agent out of Germany in May, played three seasons in the USHL before he returned to his native Germany to play for the Iserlohn Roosters of the Deutsche Eishockey Liga last year.
“That was pretty much the first time we’ve played as a line,” Chmelevski said. “I played with Checky two years ago with the ‘Cuda, but I just got to know Bergy the last couple days. Our chemistry was great today. I thought we all knew where we were going to be on the ice. I really liked the way we played.”
Chekhovich made his presence felt in his short stay at the Sharks’ main training camp last season, scoring two goals and adding an assist in his one preseason game before he was returned to Baie-Comeau of the QMJHL. Chekhovich had a huge year, as he finished second in the league with 105 points.
Chekhovich is up to 197 pounds, 13 pounds more than he was last year at this time.
“I worked my physical game and I worked in the gym a lot during the summer,” Chekhovich said. “I think I’m ready for the next level.”
Merkley’s progress
Ryan Merkley on Wednesday showed some of the offensive flair that helped make him the Sharks’ first round pick at the 2018 draft. But he feels the biggest difference in his game right now is the improvement he’s made on the defensive end, which was one of the knocks he had against him when he was selected 21st overall.
Merkley, 18, started last season in the OHL with Guelph before he was traded to Peterborough. He finished the year with 71 points in 63 regular season games, up slightly from the 67 points he had in his draft year. But he also went from -29 in 2017-18 to a +4 this past season.
“I think my defensive game’s come a long way. I know people talk about that a lot,” said Merkley, adding that his improved plus-minus numbers partly come “from age and experience.”“We were at probably 40 of his games this year. Bryan Marchment was there, checked in with him,” Wilson Jr. said. “Whenever we went to his games, we’d talked to him afterwards, talked to his billets. He had 71 points, he had the most primary assists in the OHL. He had a great year.”
