Player Profile: Blake Speers (2013 OHL Draft)

Blake Speers
Soo Thunder
Forward
5’9, 155 lbs
Year of Birth: 1997

Speed and skill are the hallmarks of Blake Speers’ game. The talented forward of modest size is an incredibly gifted skater who can transition the puck through the neutral zone with ease. Masterful puck skills allow him to receive the puck adeptly anywhere around him without dropping his pace. With puck possession, Speers is a flurry of activity – a combination of quick feet movement and high-end puck skills executed at an astonishing rate. Speers is most effective when he combines the aforementioned skill set with his agility to navigate between opponents through the middle of the ice but has a preference for skating down the wing. Speers has an effective shot and has the advantage of creating multiple scoring chances when he adopts a more central position skating towards the net.  However, he will at times, favour lanes alongside the boards which can limit his ability to make plays as he often times skates himself out of room – perhaps a function of being the faster skater on the ice. Speers’ quickness should allow him to play a positionally sound defensive game at the next level but he will have to add strength to win puck battles against larger opponents. Blake Speers is expected to be a first round draft pick at the 2013 OHL Priority Selection.

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