Hockey Foreseen
A Prospect Spotlight featuring Beau Akey
Beau Akey is a 6’0, 170-pound defenseman playing his rookie season in the OHL for the Barrie Colts. The sixteen-year-old right-shooting blueliner brings an intriguing mixture of excellent skating and hockey sense that belongs more to a 19-year-old than a player just getting started in major junior hockey.
Akey’s skating ability stands out immediately as soon as he hits the ice. He is a tremendous skater, both in up-ice speed and four-way agility. He looks equally adept and comfortable skating forward and backward and transitions between the two with almost invisible fluidity. As such, he can control space and gaps quickly, stepping into open areas to reach loose pucks or shut down attack lanes with surprising speed. With the puck in his own zone, Akey shows great hockey iq and the capacity to slow the game, make the correct reads under pressure, and execute clever little plays to either break the pressure with his feet or move to puck accurately to a teammate.