Continental Coyotes: Logan Cooley, Josh Doan thrive on opposite sides of the world

It’s hard not to consider all this a breath of fresh air after many years of the Coyotes struggling to identify promising young talent. Neither Cooley nor Doan was a slam-dunk pick for Bill Armstrong’s staff — not by any means. And while they’re far from being guaranteed stars, they’ve both exceeded expectations since being drafted.

The Coyotes gambled big when they took Cooley over Shane Wright with the No. 3 pick in the 2022 NHL Draft. The year before, they shrugged off accusations of nepotism when they nabbed Doan with their first of three selections in the second round. Today, both Cooley and Doan look like they could play meaningful roles in the NHL as soon as this upcoming season.

Doan went undrafted in 2020 after scoring just five goals and 14 points in 45 USHL games with the Chicago Steel, but he began to garner serious draft interest after showing signs of significant improvement in his D+1 year. The 6-foot-1 winger broke out with 31 goals and 70 points in 53 games with the Steel in 2020–21, prompting the Coyotes to select him with the No. 37 pick in the 2021 NHL Draft.

If Doan keeps scoring at anything close to his current rate, he’ll make it extremely difficult for André Tourigny and his staff to leave him off the opening-night roster. He isn’t the greatest skater, but he makes up for it with his confidence and skill with the puck. He’s not entirely new to the pro game, either: Doan appeared in 17 AHL games with the Tucson Roadrunners in the spring after foregoing his final two years of NCAA eligibility to sign with the Coyotes.

It might just come down to Doan and Dylan Guenther for the final regular role in the Coyotes’ bottom-six forward group. Guenther, the No. 9 overall pick in 2021, is newly eligible to play in Tucson this season and could benefit from being “the guy” on the AHL club for an extended period of time. Unless he blows the door off its hinges in the final few preseason games, Guenther’s spot could be in jeopardy.

Despite being selected in the same draft class, Doan is a year older than Guenther. He’s more physically mature and has two years of experience playing against men in college. While Guenther has 33 games of NHL experience and carries the pedigree of a top-10 pick, Doan possesses more of the blue-collar tools needed to succeed in a bottom-six role right away — plus, he has the hot stick.

Standing 5-foot-10, Cooley is the shortest player Bill Armstrong has drafted in his tenure as Coyotes general manager. It would’ve been all too easy for Arizona to pass on Cooley to take the 6-foot-1 Shane Wright, the consensus top pick leading up to the draft. Wright ultimately dropped all the way to the Seattle Kraken at No. 4.

The jury’s still out on whether Wright will turn into an impactful player at the NHL level, but there’s no debate as to whether he or Cooley had the superior post-draft season. In all fairness, Wright was more a victim of circumstance than anything else, but he struggled to find his groove in 2022–23 while bouncing between the NHL, AHL, and OHL.

Meanwhile, Cooley racked up 60 points in 39 games as an 18-year-old freshman with the Gophers and was named a finalist for the Hobey Baker Award, presented annually to the top men’s ice hockey player in the NCAA. While Wright scored seven points in seven games at the 2023 World Juniors, Cooley netted seven goals and finished second to only Connor Bedard with 14 points.

Cooley is as dynamic a skater as they come. He’s elusive, crafty, and fearless. If he pans out as the Coyotes hope he will, Cooley has a real chance to surpass Jeremy Roenick as the best center the team has ever had. And this year, he definitely could give Connor Bedard a run for his money in the Calder Trophy race.

There’s a future in which Doan turns into a quality second-line winger for the Coyotes, perhaps on a line with Conor Geekie (with whom he’s shown palpable chemistry in exhibition). He could just as easily be more of a bottom-six player — albeit a good one. Cooley is on another level. He’s a potential franchise-changing talent who could be the cornerstone of a Coyotes franchise that has desperately needed a savior for years.

On the surface, it’s tough to get too excited about a team set to play its second season in a 4,600-seat college arena without concrete plans for a permanent full-sized venue in Arizona. The Coyotes have reached the playoffs once in the last 10 years and they’ll be fighting an uphill battle to make it this season.

We’d be lying if we said we knew for certain where the Coyotes franchise will be playing beyond 2023–24. Everyone knows Mullett Arena is not a sustainable long-term solution. But the fans in Arizona (there are far more than you think) can rest easy for now knowing that help is coming on the ice.

Cooley is one of the most impressive prospects in recent memory. Doan is a great story and a chip off the old block. If everything pans out over the next few years, the Central Division might just become the Coyotes’ world — with the other seven teams living in it.

But that’s just the best-case scenario. For now, the Desert Dogs are very much still the underdogs. And with Cooley and Doan now reunited in Arizona after their separate excursions to begin the preseason, the real tests are only just about to begin.