Development camp: Pickering keeps getting stronger

CRANBERRY, Pa. -- Owen Pickering looks ready to play professional hockey.

Pickering, the Penguins' 2022 first-round pick, has needed to get bigger and stronger since the Penguins drafted him. It was only back in 2019 that he was 5 foot 7 and 145 pounds -- undersized for a young defenseman. After shooting up 10 inches in height to 6 foot 5, the rest of his body needed time to catch up. 

Pickering has been slowly filling out that big frame. He came into his first development camp in 2022 at 175 pounds, and weighed in at 194 pounds on the first day of development camp last summer. Players generally lose weight over the course of a grind of a full season, and Pickering said on Saturday's opening day of development camp that he finished the WHL season at around 186 or 188 pounds. But after continuing to put in that work in the offseason, Pickering clocked in at 200 pounds at this camp -- recouping what he lost over the course of the season, and then adding another six pounds.

He's still on the lankier side. He's not done adding strength and size. But it's encouraging how much progress Pickering has made in such short of time. With his junior career coming to an end and his professional career beginning next season, he's put himself in a good position for success.

The work outside of the gym that Pickering has done to get to this point sounds a little harder (and at times, significantly more gross) than anything he's done in the gym.

"It's like six or seven meals a day, making sure it's good calories," Pickering explained. "When I wake up, I have a shot of olive oil. There's certain tricks."

Pickering credited Kourtney Gordon, the Penguins' performance dietician who was hired by Kyle Dubas last September, with teaching him some of those tricks. She and Pickering communicate throughout the season, and Pickering follows her orders. 

He feels as if that strength from his diet and work in the gym is already paying off on the ice.

"I feel like I'm stronger," Pickering said. "I don't feel like I've gotten to a point yet where when I'm skating, when I have more weight, I'm slower. I feel stronger and more explosive the more weight I put on. That was a struggle during the year when I was playing a lot of minutes -- I was losing weight or trying really, really hard to keep it on, and that's when I feel weaker on the ice, whether that's a puck battle or whatnot."

That's all at the junior level, with the WHL's Swift Current Broncos. Despite the struggle Pickering felt, he still handled himself pretty well -- his 46 points (seven goals, 39 assists) in 59 games were a career high. He added another seven points (one goal, six assists) in nine playoff games before Brayden Yager's Moose Jaw Warriors ended Pickering's season (and junior career) in the second round.

Pickering has a handful of games of professional experience already. Two seasons ago, at the end of the 2022-23 season, Swift Current didn't make the playoffs and Wilkes-Barre/Scranton wasn't going to, either. So with Swift Current's year over, Pickering had the opportunity to finish the year in the AHL. He really didn't look great at all, getting beat physically often and going scoreless in his eight games. He wasn't ready to handle the strength of the older and bigger players, and it showed. It was a valuable learning experience for him: He really needed to work on getting stronger before he ended up back in Wilkes-Barre for real.

"It's just about maturing my game to the pro level," Pickering said of what he's working on. "It's a step. Obviously, I learned that a couple years ago. I was a lot skinnier when I played in the 'A' a couple years ago, and a lot less mature. So I feel like I'm more ready for pro hockey now."

Pickering focused on a lot more than his diet and gym routine in the last year. He feels like he's gotten better defensively -- in part due to it becoming more of a focus of his, and in part due to Swift Current's focus as a team. With more high-powered offense in the forward group, Pickering was relied on more for his defense this season.

In all likelihood, Pickering will start the season in Wilkes-Barre. He needs to gain more professional experience at that level before cracking the NHL roster, and there isn't quite room at the NHL level yet anyway. But management isn't simply open to Pickering pushing for an NHL spot midseason -- they're expecting it.

"I expect those two younger kids, Yager and Pickering, to push," Dubas said in his season-ending media availabiltiy. "Have a huge summer, assert yourself. We've shown here in this last stretch, if you're a young player and you're willing to push through the summer, you got a massive opportunity. You can have a shot here with us. That's what we need, desperately."

Assistant general manager Jason Spezza stressed that point on Saturday.

"This is a big summer for him turning pro," Spezza said of the Penguins' top defense prospect. "It's a big jump from junior hockey. I love that he has enthusiasm. He wants to come in and bang the door down and make the Penguins, and we'll welcome that challenge and judge him by how he's playing and put him on the right path."

Pickering is hoping he's able to accelerate on that path to making the NHL lineup this season.

"As a young guy, you want to make the team, you want to come in and take a spot, and that's the goal for everybody in this room," Pickering said. "That's been a goal since I was five years old, to play in the NHL. That hasn't changed."

JOE ZAK / PITTSBURGH PENGUINS

Owen Pickering on Day 1 of the Penguins' development camp in Cranberry, Pa. on Saturday