Malte Gustafsson hasn’t allowed himself to think about it yet, to envision a future Islanders blue line with him and Matthew Schaefer — both first-round picks, both left-handed, both just 18 years previous — in distinguished roles.
“He’s very, very grounded and humble when it comes to his journey,” recalled Tom Jankovic, his head coach with the HV71 under-20 staff and assistant coach with Sweden’s under-18 nationwide staff.
When Schaefer launched Gustafsson in Buffalo as the Islanders’ choice at No. 13 in last month’s NHL draft, there was something becoming about the duo overlapping.
One apparent piece of their future welcomed another one who could presumably — and quickly — play his approach into it.
Gustafsson, who said it’d be wonderful to skate with Schaefer, rose rapidly through the ranks in Sweden as an indispensable defenseman and plans to play for HV71 again next season.
After that, though, the Islanders might have a choice to make with the 6-foot-4, 230-pounder who “came as advertised” to growth camp last week, Islanders head coach Pete DeBoer said.
“I think he will be a top Swedish defenseman in the NHL someday,” Jankovic advised The Post. “If it’s when he’s 24 or when he’s 28, I don’t know, but I think he will be there because he has all the tools. He has the right mindset.”
There’s no rush, either. Gustafsson deliberate to enhance his offensive sport and add muscle next season in the Swedish Hockey League.
Niklas Eriksson, his HV71 head coach who took over close to the finish of last season, said that he can use the bigger rinks in Sweden to put together for the smaller ones in North America.
It’ll power Gustafsson to simplify his sport and to make first passes rapidly, something on which he’ll get to work while doubtless logging 20-plus minutes a sport and filling roles on both the energy play and penalty kill.
Jankovic thought Gustafsson, a self-described “annoying” defenseman, would get picked earlier in the draft.
Malte Gustafsson seems to be to transfer the puck during the Islanders’ growth camp scrimmage July 1. Dennis A. Clark for the NY Post
He can skate alongside both defensive and offensive defensemen, seamlessly complementing both and in a position to choose up either position when wanted.
He constructed a two-way sport where dimension, attain and an potential to carry the puck grew to become his defining traits, and his motion close to the blue line and passing potential could make him an choice to quarterback a power-play unit in the NHL — perhaps the Islanders’ second one behind Schaefer, Jankovic said.
“He has so many tools when it comes to what he can do,” Jankovic said, “so I think that’s his biggest strength, and as a coach, you want that on the ice.”
Even before the draft, Gustafsson appeared in lots of video games with stakes connected.
Malte Gustafsson is pictured after getting drafted June 26. NHLI via Getty Images
He collected 12 factors in 19 video games with the under-20 staff last season and added another three factors in 27 regular-season video games in the SHL.
He helped Sweden earn a gold medal at the U18 World Championship, skating over 28 minutes against Canada in the quarterfinals, over 29 against Czechia in the semifinals and another 26:39 against Slovakia in the gold-medal sport.
Gustafsson helped HV71’s males’s staff keep away from relegation in the SHL, too, by contributing to their sweep in a best-of-seven sequence between the Thirteenth- and 14th-place groups — with huge monetary ramifications at stake if HV71 lost.
He quarterbacked the second power-play unit and impressed common supervisor Johan Hult with how he dealt with the strain of these video games.
Malte Gustafsson is pictured at the NHL Scouting Combine June 6. NHLI via Getty Images
“How I use my size and length to shut down players, play physical, really being annoying on the ice, showing that I’m there,” Gustafsson advised The Post after the Islanders’ growth camp scrimmage last week, “I think that’s the biggest part of my game.”
And if Gustafsson provides power in his legs to become more explosive, Hult said, he’ll “be even more annoying, that’s for sure.”
Hult discovered it tough to describe a ceiling for him because, in his eyes, “the ceiling is not set.”
Gustafsson could symbolize Sweden in the Olympics.
He could stay up to Jankovic’s prediction as one of the greatest Swedish defensemen in the NHL.
He could make the 5 other groups who took other defensemen forward of the Islanders in the first spherical look silly.
That would all unfold years in the future.
That takes more than an preliminary introduction at growth camp to really obtain.
This — the draft, the HV71 video games, the remaining SHL season before taking the leap to what’s next — has been just the begin for Gustafsson.
“I think the sky’s the limit for this kid,” Jankovic said.
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