Kingston Frontenacs GameDay February 13, 2016

How do you turn a devastating
injury to a promising Finnish
import into a 6’5” Russian rookie
defenseman? Darren Keily and the
Frontenacs staff pulled it off and they did
it without much time or preparation.
After playing all 68 games for Kingston
last season, promising defenseman
Jarkko Parikka tore his Achilles tendon in
a practice prior to the start of the playoffs.
The injury was described as traumatic
but the training staff held out hope that
he might be able to return in the fall.
After talking to Jarkko, his family and his
agent in June, Keily said that the injury
was not responding as well as had been
expected. Following some discussions
the parties came to a mutual decision
and Parikko was released. Unfortunately
by the time they reached that conclusion,
the Frontenacs were well behind in terms
of scouting the 2015 import class.
“Normally I’m at the U18’s because
no matter how much you look at the
scouting reports, you’re always more
comfortable if you see the boys play
before you draft them,” said Keily.
“Since we thought we had our imports
(Lamikko and Parikka) I didn’t attend the
U18’s last spring so I had to depend on
our scouts and advisors.”
Those advisors had discovered
Konstantin Chernyuk, a lanky Russian
defenseman playing tier two junior
hockey in Wichita Falls, Texas. The
native of St. Petersburg, Russia had
a good foundation of skills and as the
saying goes in hockey circles, you can’t
teach size.
Coach Paul McFarland praised Keily
and the hockey operations staff. “Doug
and Darren worked hard on digging up
information and finding the right player,”
said McFarland. “Konstantin is a player
that’s come in and gotten better each
and every day. We like big defensemen
and he’s got great feet and moves the
puck well.”
For his part Konstantin feels he’s
adjusting to the speed and high skill
level of the OHL. “The first game with
the Frontenacs wasn’t that good for me
and I knew it was going to be hard,”
said Chernyuk. “Coach told me it was
going to be much faster and I didn’t
really understand the tactics but now I’m
starting to know what the players will do
and how they will play.”
By the end of October, the young
Russian was still looking for his first point
but in a game against Peterborough he did
manage to acquit himself well in an OHL
rite of passage – his first fight. Chernyuk,
who at 17 and 175 pounds isn’t yet the
imposing rearguard he will eventually
develop into, took on Petes’ rookie Ian
McKinnon and managed to land a few
bombs before the linesmen stepped in to
break up the scrap. Neither player was
injured and Chernyuk received a rousing
OFFICIAL GAMEDAY PROGRAM, VOLUME 43, 2015
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