As expected, Valenti received very little ice time in his professional debut, but he certainly made the most of it. What stood out more than anything is his hockey sense, which has always been his strongest asset. He had zero issues keeping up with the speed of the game and played extremely strong positionally. He also anticipated plays very well, especially in one situation where he saw his defenders were going to win a puck battle down low, so he snuck away from the forecheckers and got open for a breakout pass on the right wing. From there, he played a perfect tape-to-tape entry pass through traffic to send his linemate on a scoring chance. He also displayed strong defensive positioning and communicated well on the backcheck, despite being a 17-year-old who's in the big league for the first time. Offensively, Valenti didn't have too many chances, but did have one strong scoring chance where he played a drop pass at the right boards before circling around the net to get open for a rebound. He did get the rebound but missed – again, strong anticipation and perfect work to get into a high-danger area uncovered, though.
The only minor negative was the way he moved around the ice sometimes, but it was the typical junior-player-playing-pro situation. Although his mind was clearly able to keep up with the speed, he will need some time to get used to moving his feet at the same speed too. At times, he looked a little lost out there and moved at "junior speed." He hovered around the ice a lot, but not like someone who falls back purposely to avoid coverage, and rather like someone who is used to moving at that speed because the game around him is usually much slower.
Overall, he made a very strong debut, though, and I hope he sticks around for a while or at least gets some more chances throughout the season. I've been following Valenti for three years now, and his development has been excellent. I like him better than Dominik Bokk and strongly believe he can be a top-three-round pick in 2019.
