David Reinbacher’s game : In-Depth Breakdown

Austrian defender who played against adults in the Swiss league this season, Reinbacher is a prospect who has shown strong and constant progress throughout the season. Showing a very good defensive maturity as well as physical qualities already on point, he is one of the players of this draft who is the closest to making the leap into the NHL.

He stands out for his great efficiency in his territory. From day 1, that was what his identity was based on. Where he excels the most defensively is in one-on-one battles as well as along the boards. He shows a lot of will and determination in these situations. Defeat is not an option, he will manage at all costs to emerge victorious from each confrontation in which he is involved. Along with working hard, he works smart about positioning his body properly in such scenarios, making sure to gain leverage over his opponents. People might be tempted to downgrade that if it’s what he mostly brings to the table, however, defenders who advocate such a style of play is starting to become very rare. In the last 4 drafts, there are only 5 defensemen called in the first round who played similarly in the one-on-one situations; Moritz Seider, Kaiden Guhle, Braden Schneider, David Jiricek and Lian Bichsel. NHL teams are willing to pay a hefty price to acquire such players. It may seem retrograde to some as hockey becomes increasingly spectacular and fast-paced, but the ‘Hard Skills’ (winning battles along the boards, blocking shots, locking the front of the net, hitting, etc.) are just as important as ‘Soft Skills’ (pivoting in tight spaces, handling the puck skillfully, etc.). The argument that individual skills can’t be taught has a lot of sense, however, I’ve been looking closely at around 80-90 prospects per season for a few years now and I can say that the prospects who play ‘tough ‘ are very rare and it is not something you can learn just like that either. Going back to Reinbacher, his desire to compete is extremely high and the number of one-on-one battles he has won in the season, against men, is staggering. During the NHL playoffs, I had heard Dallas Eakins, head-coach of the Anaheim Ducks last season, mention that his coaching staff had done business with an advanced-stats firm and that one of the things that came out was that in a game, the puck ends up 3 feet or less from one of the boards 80% of the time. It is enormous ! And this is precisely where Reinbacher is most useful. It is in these aspects that you win games, which is even more true in series 4 of 7.

The Austrian defender showed to me he was a ‘Gamer’ when I saw him agree to pay the price for the good of his team. This sequence shows it very well.

He recovers a puck behind his net and two opposing forwards charge at him at full speed. He could easily hand the puck over to his partner in defense, but the latter dropped his stick.

Instead of sending the puck along the boards and possibly putting one of his teammates in a tough situation, Reinbacher positions himself to absorb the shock of his opponent’s impending check, and at the very last second, gets rid of him with a pivot (still absorbing a good part of the collision) and then protects the puck against the other forward.

For the rest of his defensive game, he showed very good progress. At the start of the season he shone when time came to defend and he was close to the puck carrier, able to engage the body, but when he had to cover the zone and monitor passing lanes, things got tough a little. He was guilty of following the puck too much with his eyes and forgetting his covers. Things have improved, he now shows better environmental awareness and he nullifies passing lanes with an active stick.

Also, his recognition of situations as well as his location on the ice is very good. In my viewing, he made a very impressive number of opportunistic interventions to ‘pinch’ and also in puck support to a teammate.

Reinbacher is helped by a good skating foundation that prevents him from being outpaced by opposing forwards. He is an excellent straight-line skater. His top speed is very good and more importantly, his acceleration is just as good. This allows him to close spaces very quickly against opponents who thought they could have more time to make a play. It also allows him to skate the puck out of danger himself rather than blindly clearing it and risking making a turnover. I saw him during certain sequences taking control of the puck in a static position in his own zone, and from a few strides only, being able to get rid of his coverer.

Offensively, the Austrian defender has shown progress throughout the year. Mainly in his handling of the puck, which could have been considered as a certain shortcoming in him earlier in the year. He is now able to react to the poke check of his opponents with good dexterity in his hands.

His puck distribution game is pretty solid overall. Without showing big flashes, he is able to execute surprisingly delicate passes by passing the puck under the stick of his opponents to reach a teammate. On power plays, he can also use effectively the player inside the ‘Bumper’ position from the blue line, rather than just delegating to the player along the boards or his partner at the blue line. A certain audacity started to show up towards the end of the season when I saw him make cross-ice passes after faking a slap shot.

His slap shot is quite heavy, but the greatest value surrounding his shot is that he manages to reach the net for the vast majority of the time.

Finally, much like his game without the puck, Reinbacher has good situational awareness and understanding of free space as he chooses the right moments to advance deep into the offensive zone.

He projects himself as a player who can eat big minutes and who can face the best elements of the opposing team. It is especially in the playoffs that his importance will be felt and that his coach will be able to rely on him. His offensive game may have one more level to reach as we saw him start to play with more audacity towards the end of the season. He could take on the duties of a second wave on the power play.