You couldn’t help but notice Corson Ceulemans on Friday night.
As the Cleveland Monsters began their postseason run vs. Syracuse, the Blue Jackets’ first-round pick was a key part of the action.
There he was, converting a pass from Luca Del Bel Belluz to give the Jackets' AHL affiliate a 3-0 lead in the first period of Game 1 of their division semifinal series. Then there was the play early in the second when the defenseman's turnover helped give the Crunch a breakaway and their first goal of the game.
Ceulemans also had a big hand in the most dramatic moment of the game in the third period, sweeping a loose puck off the goal line behind goalie Zach Sawchenko to keep the Monsters ahead by a 3-2 score.
But perhaps most importantly, Ceulemans was on the ice in a crucial situation, deployed by head coach Trent Vogelhuber with less than a minute to go and the Monsters still protecting that one-goal lead. Vogelhuber put Ceulemans on the ice coming out of a timeout and the Monsters facing a defensive zone faceoff, and the defenseman helped get the job done as Cleveland finished off the 3-2 playoff win.
“There’s no question his competitiveness, his intent and his willingness to defend,” Vogelhuber said of the 22-year-old blueliner. “He’ll block a shot, he’ll box out. The intent is there. With a minute left and you know it’s gonna be a war down to the end, I know he’s gonna compete and he’s gonna be there. It’s just continuing the simplicity or reliability of a defenseman that we’re trying to round out.”
Such is the development curve for a player whose biggest blessing – his ability to play a daring game and aggressively jump into plays that other defensemen may not ever see – is also a bit of a curse at the pro level.
The Blue Jackets took Ceulemans 25th overall in the 2021 draft because of the skills you can’t teach – the vision, the size (6-2, 191), the shot and the confidence to use all of those abilities – and spent the past few years working on the teaching part.
Sometimes at the pro level, that bravado leads to mistakes that end up in the back of your own net, and the task for Ceulemans has been finding that balance. He’s far from the first offensively gifted defenseman to have to tackle that challenge, and the Blue Jackets have seen progress from the right-shot defenseman over the past few years with Cleveland.
“He’s got to that point again where he’s being assertive,” Chris Clark, the CBJ assistant general manager who oversees the AHL team, said at midseason. “He’s a lot stiffer defending. We know he can play offense, so we’re not even worried about that. We want him to work on his defending, and he’s taken big steps in that. Had he not gotten hurt last year, I think he would have been way higher in us evaluating him.”
Indeed, some of the biggest hurdles Ceulemans has had to clear the past two seasons have been injuries. After an up-and-down first season with the Monsters in 2023-24, the Regina, Saskatchewan, native was making major strides in his development a season ago when he suffered a shoulder injury that ended his campaign.
This year, he missed time because of injury twice during the season, and through his three-plus years with the Monsters, Ceulemans has played just 157 regular-season games. This year was his most productive by far, as Ceulemans notched AHL career highs in goals (eight), assists (16) and points (24) as well as games played (64).
“With the injury last year, it definitely sucked not being able to play at the end of the year in the playoffs with the boys, but it gave me an opportunity to get in the gym and get stronger and faster,” Ceulemans said. “I think I used that to my advantage and put my best foot forward this year. I’ve had a good season so far, so I just want to keep it going.”
His skills were on full display in the Monsters’ playoff opener, as he had the game-winning tally and an assist to help the team to the victory. The goal was a perfect example of his ability to read a play and jump in when the time is right, as the Monsters won a board battle along the left-wing wall in the offensive zone. Del Bel Belluz spied Ceulemans cutting in from the blue line and fed him in the slot, with Ceuelmans kicking the puck to his stick before roofing a shot over goalie Jon Gillies.
“You definitely have to pick your spots,” Ceulemans said of cutting to the net on the play. “You don’t want to be jumping too often, but it was a board battle. I saw they had three guys in there and then their low D, netfront D got pretty close and their low winger collapsed quite a bit, too. Then the puck went to Del Bel and he can make good plays when he has the puck, so I trusted him to get it to me in the slot. I thought I fumbled it a bit, but then I was able to get the shot off and go bar down.”
Equally key was his goal-line clearance that kept the Monsters ahead in the third, as a Syracuse shot through traffic pinged its way around the crease and eventually found itself sliding toward the goal line. Ceulemans was on the spot, though, putting his stick behind Sawchenko and pulling the potential tying goal off the line.
“That’s why you work on the soft mitts in front of the net,” he joked.
For Vogelhuber, the defenseman’s development comes down to two things – continuing to master the balance of when to take a risk and when to be safe, as well as staying healthy. Ceulemans has made strides in the former over his three-plus seasons in Cleveland, but it continues to be a process.
“He had the play on the turnover there on the first goal at the blue line that can’t happen, but I would say he’s much more reliable overall,” Vogelhuber said after Game 1. “Those are the types of plays that don’t pop up as often but did pop up a lot more. It’s been interesting with him because his health has been a major issue for the three years. I think his season was really rolling (this year) and then he missed the better part of six weeks with two separate injuries.
“It’s been a little bit of a grind to find his footing, returning to form, but I think recently he’s been better. But I think you see right there, that’s Ceuls. He’s a 200-foot player, and we’re still working on eliminating that 10 percent of high risk and emphasizing the reliability as a defenseman. But he’s come a long way in three years; he just has to stay healthy.”
Ceulemans was one of three first-round picks by the Blue Jackets in 2021, joining fifth overall selection Kent Johnson and 12th overall pick Cole Sillinger. He’s one of just four first-round picks from that draft yet to play in the NHL, but that’s just how the road has worked out for him.
The defenseman spent his first two years after the draft at the University of Wisconsin, putting up solid numbers (15-30-45 in 67 games) for a struggling team. His Monsters career has been about making the strides necessary to become an NHL defender, and he feels like he’s closer than he’s ever been.
“It’s a privilege to be a first-round pick, and it just shows that you put in the work to get there,” Ceulemans said. “Sometimes, it doesn’t come right away, and it’s just a matter of trusting the process, trusting your abilities, just continuing to want to get better and make that jump to the next level, whenever that is. So I’m just going to keep putting my best foot forward and do everything I can to keep developing and keep making myself an NHL defenseman.”
