“I think he’s on the right track – I think he’s producing right now,” Rochester assistant coach Vinny Prospal said. “I wish it would’ve been like that right off the bat, right from the beginning of the year, but it’s great to see because that was really the only thing that was missing from his game.”
Ostlund used the two-month absence to get bigger and create positive habits, so once he returned to the Amerks lineup, he’d be in a better position to get back into the scoring column.
While the injury restricted upper-body movement and prevented him from shooting, he worked with Amerks strength and conditioning coach Nick Craven; together, they found ways to continue Ostlund’s development without shooting.
“I was able to skate but not shoot,” Ostlund said. “It was hard skates with the strength coach and doing everything I could do in the gym to make me stronger. And I gained a couple of pounds, too.”
Once Ostlund returned from injury on Dec. 20, the fatigue from his injury showed. In his first five games back, he registered just seven shots and zero points.
For the Stockholm, Sweden native acclimating to a new place, wanting to live up to his first-round billing, and having to deal with a cold spell and an injury in his first full professional season in North America, doubt can start to creep in.
“You’re going to go through a cold stretch in your career,” head coach Michael Leone said. “It’s not a smooth and narrow path. You have to have a belief and inner drive of yourself. You know it’ll eventually change and there has to be a lot of mental toughness involved.”
Luckily for Ostlund, Leone and Prospal saw the work he put into being a 200-foot player in Rochester, even if he wasn’t being rewarded for the 100 feet on offense.
Seeing Ostlund come to Blue Cross Arena every day with a hunger to rehab, compete and improve, Leone developed an appreciation for the 20-year-old and what he was trying to achieve with the pressure attached to his name. Leone told Ostlund as much in their meetings during the cold spell.
“We just told him that we really believe in him and that we have a lot of confidence in him as a player,” Leone said. “When you’re around somebody every day and you see how hard they work, you have an appreciation, and you pull for them and you’re in their corner. He’s a 1C and he’s playing like it right now.”
In part due to the belief instilled in him, and the work he put in, he eventually got his name on the scoresheet, assisting on a Nikita Novikov goal Jan. 10. Then, two games later, he got another assist. And another the next game, and in the next, a goal.
Before he knew it, Ostlund had not only shaken off his scoring drought, but he had put together a hot streak, recording a point in 14 of 21 games since Jan. 10. That stretch includes six multi-point efforts.
Ostlund’s recent production has catapulted himself to first on the team among forwards in plus-minus (+14), fourth on the team in goals (10) and tied for ninth in points (22) despite playing 33 of Rochester’s 54 games.
