Adam Engstrom

Ian Moran’s Thoughts: Engstrom is a well balanced two-way defender who does not sacrifice his defensive responsibilities to provide secondary offense. In the defensive zone he is very patient as the weakside defender, almost acting as a general or on ice coach as he directs traffic and sorts out high paced scissor plays. He plays with a wide skating base and deep knee bend that allows him to be powerful through contact. Once his decision is made we like his four way explosiveness as he defends with a stick on puck style that forces poor decisions and turnovers. Engstrom makes very quick reads in offensive transition. His passes are hard, flat and well timed. It is easy to see that his forwards trust his passes because the are willing to skate into traffic to receive them We also like his ability to trap or bait opposing forwards, especially F2’s and F3’s, into misjudging their forechecking depth which allows him to make indirect passes that trap opposing forwards going in the wrong direction. Engstrom has shown a very smooth catch and release snap shot from the offensive blueline. After catching the pass he has the footwork to easily slide left or right and we really like the way he slides his bottom hand on the shaft of the stick to quickly adjust his shooting angle. He is not afraid to one-time bouncing pucks and (again) his footwork allows him to slide left or right to expand his shooting zone. We look at him and see historically Engstrom has never represented Sweden on an International stage. Some people will feel that is a negative, but we feel his steady improvement over the past 2 seasons is just the beginning of what we will see out of him over the next few years.