Canucks Hope They've Found A Hit Man In Former Viper Volpatti:

This was in last weeks Vancouver Sun Newspaper:

Canucks hope they've found a hit man in Revelstoke's Aaron Volpatti

By Brad Ziemer, Vancouver Sun September 13, 2010

PENTICTON — He went to a school named Brown, but Aaron Volpatti’s favourite colours are black and blue.

And green, which the Vancouver Canucks had to cough up lots of in order to get him signed this past spring.

It was Volpatti’s physical play, his willingness to crash and bang on every shift, that convinced the Canucks to sign him after the Revelstoke native finished his senior year at Brown University on Rhode Island. The fact that his offensive game blossomed in that senior year made Volpatti a highly sought after free agent.

The Edmonton Oilers, Nashville Predators, New York Rangers and at least a couple of other teams all made runs at him, but the Canucks won his services and paid handsomely to get him. Volpatti received a $200,000 US signing bonus as part of his two-year deal that guarantees him $200,000 a season at the AHL level and more than $600,000 should he land a job with the Canucks.

“We finished our season at Brown on March 20th or something,” Volpatti said Monday. “That night and the next day was a pretty busy time. It was fun though. I was talking to my agent and different teams were coming to the table.”

He chose the Canucks and it wasn’t all about the money.

“They were the first team to approach me, they genuinely showed the most interest,” he said. “And obviously I’m from B.C. It’s pretty hard to say no to your home team that you watched growing up.”

Volpatti, a left-winger, joined the Manitoba Moose of the American Hockey League for their final eight regular-season games last spring and also played in five playoff games.

“I got in a fight and scored a goal in my first game, so that was a nice icebreaker,” he said, smiling.

There’s no fighting in college hockey, but Volpatti still managed to rack up 115 penalty minutes in his senior year. But what most impressed NHL scouts was the way his offensive game matured in his senior year. Volpatti had managed just 15 goals in his first three seasons at Brown, but scored 17 and added 15 assists in 37 games in his senior year.

“I am not going to be a 100-point scorer,” he said. “But I feel like I’ve got a pretty good shot and am pretty solid around the net. So I feel like I can chip in offensively.”

If he can do that and continue his strong physical play, the Canucks think Volpatti is a guy who could soon be a third- or fourth-line NHL regular.

Assistant general manager Laurence Gilman calls Volpatti “a wrecking ball” kind of player who hits everything in sight. He did just that in Sunday night’s opener of the Young Stars tournament when he laid a number of big hits on some of the Edmonton Oiler prospects. On one shift he sent a couple of the Oiler youngsters flying like bowling pins on successive hits.

“He hits heavy and hard,” said Moose coach Claude Noel, who is running the prospects camp here. “He hits through people. He made a hit in the third there, the guy didn’t respond well to that one, I don’t think. That was a heavy hit. He can be an impact player physically and he showed that.”

The six-foot-one, 185-pound Volpatti has always been that kind of player. Before going to Brown he amassed more than 250 penalty minutes in two-and-a-half seasons with the Vernon Vipers of the B.C. Hockey League.

“You can’t change your game, your game’s your game,” Volpatti said. “I have played the same way all my life, so why change it now, right ... The one thing I have to watch is don’t get out of position and try to make a huge hit and give up an odd-man rush or something like that. Just try and play an all-around game and just be really physical. That’s what I have to do.”

At age 25, Volpatti is the elder statesman at the rookie camp. He’s five or six years older than many of the players here. And yes, he does feel a little old, but said he has always been something of a late bloomer.

“I didn’t go to college until I was 21, didn’t come to Vernon until I was 17 or 18, so it has always kind of been like that and I am used to it. I embrace that, it’s fine for me, and it’s good hanging out with some of the younger guys and stuff like that.”

Volpatti’s age likely means he won’t have as long to prove himself as some of the other younger Canuck prospects. He has to make good on his current two-year deal because if he doesn’t there likely won’t be another one waiting for him.

“He is far more mature than most players entering the league,” Gilman said Monday. “If he is going to become a bona fide NHL player it is going to happen in fairly rapid progression.”

Volpatti seems well prepared for life after hockey, although he hopes that is a long way off. While at Brown, an Ivy League school where they take their studies seriously, he earned a degree in human biology. He talks of a possible future career in health care. But right now, he’s focused on hurting the opposition.

Volpatti demonstrated some of his offensive skill Monday night, when he scored two second-period goals to help the Canuck prospects beat the San Jose Sharks 5-3.

Volpatti also set the tone for the night when he decisioned San Jose's Joe Loprieno in a fight early in the first period. There were three other fights in a game that had lots of emotion.

Matt Fraser opened scoring in the first period for the Canucks, who led 3-0 after two periods.

Leigh Salters and Nick Schaus both beat Vancouver goalie Eddie Lack early in the third to make it 3-2, but defenceman Chris Tanev finished off a pass by Jordan Schroeder on a Vancouver power play at 6:59 and Pierre-Olivier Morin added another three minutes later to make it 5-2. Schaus got the other San Jose goal on a shot from the right point.