Coaches aren't typically inclined to guide recruits to other teams. But John McLean knew this wasn't a typical situation.
The then-head coach at Malden Catholic had Riley Duran, an eighth grader at the time, playing on an Islanders team he coached on the side. Duran liked playing for McLean and wanted to go to Malden Catholic for high school.
McLean recognized the one issue. Duran's father, Jim, was the head coach at Woburn High. He wanted Duran to experience playing for his father. And Duran wanted it, too. He grew up as a waterboy for his father's team. He would've loved to have played all four years there.
"It's a once-in-a-lifetime thing," Duran said. "I'm glad he talked me into that. Glad I did it."
But the hockey landscape is the way it is. Duran played a season at Woburn High before going to Malden Catholic for the 2017-18 season. He jumped from the MIAA to prep with Lawrence Academy for 2018-20, before being drafted in the sixth round of the 2020 NHL Draft by the Boston Bruins.
Then came a season with the Youngstown Phantoms in the USHL and three more with Providence College. Now, he's in the Bruins organization. Not a bad path for a local kid.
It's also not too different from what kids can take today: two years in the MIAA and two years in prep before moving on to junior hockey.
Some things, however, have changed quite a bit in the last five to 10 years. Duran, and other pros fighting for spots on the Bruins this year, know better than most — because they came up through prep hockey.
Standing out in prep
When Michael Callahan looked at prep schools as a sixth grader from Franklin, Mass., Roxbury Latin was coming off a 1-20 season in 2011-12. The next year, Roxbury Latin went 6-17.
Callahan's older brother went to St. Sebastian's, so even at a young age, he understood the prep scene more than most. Still, as he toured Roxbury Latin, he fell in love — and its struggling hockey team didn't faze him.
"I went to the campus and really liked it," Callahan said. "It was one of those opportunities where I couldn't pass it up."
The byproduct for Callahan: He got to play. A lot.
As an eighth grader in 2013-14, Callahan was on the varsity team, leading the defensemen in assists with eight. He played a lot as a freshman with 16 points, 19 as a sophomore and 32 as a junior in 2016-17, which was over a point per game for the season.
"There's value to being in a place where you can do everything," Callahan said. "Being at a smaller program, I think it helped me stand out more when I was younger. When you go to a big school that has recruits and a ton of guys, I feel like when you're younger, it's easier to get lost in the shuffle. Going to a place that you might not win every game, but you get the opportunities to grow."
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John Farinacci took a different route. The New Jersey native opted to play for Delbarton School (N.J.) as a freshman before playing for Shattuck-St. Mary's 16U team the next season. Around this same time, he was hitting the age where players were getting picked for the U.S. National Team Development Program or opting for the USHL at a young age.
Farinacci didn't think the USHL was in the cards quite yet, but he knew he wanted a change. So he utilized family connections and being related to Dexter Southfield head coach Danny Donato, and went to Dexter.
"The hockey when I was at Dexter, the teams you're playing are very comparable to the teams you play out in Shattuck," he said.
In his first year at Dexter, he led the team with 26 goals and 53 points in 27 games. He followed that up by notching 33 points in 16 games as a senior in 2018-19, along with playing some games for the NTDP's U18 team. That helped him get picked in the third round (76th overall) by the Arizona Coyotes come June 2019.
Jumping straight from prep to college
Jordan Harris was at Kimball Union from 2015-18, an impact player for the Wildcats in all three seasons.
"I cannot speak highly enough about KUA and what it did for me," Harris said.
Come senior year, Harris had 35 points in 37 games and was one of the best prep defensemen. It helped him get picked in the third round (71st overall) by the Montreal Canadiens that June. He was already committed to Northeastern and planned to spend an additional year with the USHL's Youngstown Phantoms. But the Huskies liked what they saw and wanted him immediately.
Instead of playing a year with the Phantoms in 2018-19, he was a freshman at Northeastern.
"It was a hard transition," Harris said. "I didn't feel comfortable, probably until halfway through my first year. It took me a bit. It was a big jump. But the coaching staff was great with me, and Tim [Whitehead] helped with that preparation."
The next year, Farinacci took a similar path, going from Dexter Southfield to Harvard with hardly any time in juniors.
"It was definitely a pretty good jump," Farinacci said. "Going from playing with 18-year-olds to 24-year-olds."
Farinacci made an immediate impact at Harvard as a freshman, posting 22 points in 31 games. His transition was made easier by some of his teammates having made a similar jump. Jack Rathbone (West Roxbury, Mass.) and Ryan Donato (Scituate, Mass.) went from Dexter to Harvard, and Reilly Walsh went from Proctor to Harvard.
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"Those guys made it a lot easier," Farinacci said.
It's fairly rare for a player to go right from prep to Division 1 college hockey. It's even more rare for a player to go from prep to college and make a big impact right away.
Does Farinacci wish the landscape were the way it used to be?
"Yeah, I do," he said. "I can't even imagine now, with the new rules and stuff, how that works. I think it's a tough jump, but I think it's a good one, especially at 18 years old. You're going and you're playing college hockey. Obviously, some guys need to play in the USHL and get a couple years of experience under their belts. You're challenging yourself right away by going to play that higher pace and more physical competition."
Looking back on college recruiting
When a Providence College coach first approached Callahan during the recruiting process, he was stunned.
"They were here?" Callahan remembered thinking. "They came to this rink?"
It was a wake-up call for Callahan, who had been given a piece of advice by his father: You never know who's watching.
"There are a lot of times you'll play games and you won't think they mean a whole lot, and they might not in the moment," Callahan said. "But you never know who's going to be there."
It was also fairly easy to look into the crowd and see the throngs of college coaches with their team-issued jackets.
"At certain prep rinks, you can't miss them," Callahan said. "There's not a lot of space. I remember when I started at Roxbury Latin, we didn't have a rink, so we played at the old Dexter rink, which isn't even a rink anymore. It was one of those rinks you couldn't miss [college onlookers].
"My agent [Matt Keator] still jokes with me today. He's like, 'I can't believe I went and watched you play in that damn rink, the place was a dump, it was freezing.' Like, yep, that's where I started."
Callahan, Harris, Farinacci and Duran never dealt with NIL and money in recruiting.
"That wouldn't have affected my decision," Harris said. "That's not why I would ever pick a school. But for some kids, like yeah, if you're making $100,000 as a college kid every year, that's money that could set you up."
Duran agreed — he still would have gone to Providence College. There just may have been more factors in the decision.
"It's like free agency now," Duran said. "It was kind of different. I was really interested in UMass and UNH. I loved Mike Souza, but Nate [Leaman] was the first one to give me a real option, and he saw something in me, so I just went with him. Nowadays, I don't know if you can turn down six figures, though."
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When Callahan arrived at Providence College in 2018, a lot would happen throughout his time there. The COVID-19 pandemic wreaked havoc on the schedule. In 2021, the NCAA instituted a new rule that allowed players to transfer and not have to sit out for a full season.
Is that good for college hockey?
"I think there's value in fighting for your spot and earning a coach's trust," Callahan said. "Obviously, I also think that sometimes circumstances change, and the grass is greener somewhere else. But nowadays, you see a lot of packing up and leaving instead of competing for an extra year and seeing if you can crack through."
Changes to fall hockey?
Fall hockey is a big topic at the moment because, well, it's October. More prep teams have opted to play together in the fall. That wasn't a thing when these four players were coming up.
"I kind of enjoyed playing on those [Neponset Valley] River Rats and [Cape Cod] Whalers teams," Callahan said. "You've got kids from all over the place. We had Dexter kids, a couple kids from Seb's and Belmont Hill. So it was kind of nice to get a mix. Maybe keeping the prep teams together is better for the length of the season as a preseason to kind of get ready."
When Harris was at Kimball Union, his father would come get him on the weekends to make the drive back to Boston to play for the Junior Eagles.
Now, Kimball Union plays together as the Fall Prep Wildcats.
"I think transportation-wise, it's a lot easier," Harris said. "I probably wouldn't hate it at all staying at KUA. It worked out really well for me because I had so many buddies on the Eagles already. I also played that fall prep league in Salem [N.H.], so it gave me a chance to go home and stuff on the weekends, so I liked it."
Some coaches want prep to play a full season, having it start in the fall. Farinacci, who played full-season hockey with Shattuck, has an interesting perspective on that.
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"Yes, I did," Farinacci said when asked if he wished prep were full-season for him. "But it was also really cool to be able to play with guys from other teams. It was cool just to play with other guys from other prep school teams. That was a cool piece, but I loved my Dexter teammates and those guys.
"So yes, I wish you had the full season and got to play with them from September all the way until March or whenever the season ended."
