I’ve watched three of the Team Black games now, and combined with all of my previous views of Matej Teply I feel quite confident saying that this is a player who is generally underrated. He is a relatively poised defenseman who really picks his moments to break out and unleash his offense. He’s a good skater and puck handler who doesn’t get pushed around in his own zone and can move the puck effectively using his feet or his passing. He provides good support by keeping his body positioned towards friendly puck carriers – his pivots and edgework are a great asset in this respect. In doing so he’s able to see the ice well while he prepares to receive the puck, and act quickly once it’s on his stick.

Matej Teply made an impact with the puck relatively early in the game. He consistently showed the strength of low hesitation in activating his feet to transition the puck after quickly assessing his options from the back end. He protected the puck well to evade traffic in the neutral zone and kept his head up so that he could defer to his forwards appropriately after gaining the offensive zone. I’d like to see him improve the quickness and power of his shot. I find that he does a nice job getting himself into ideal shooting lanes where that extra bit of power would enable him to make a more significant offensive impact. I was impressed with Teply’s tendencies to actively defend, both in the neutral zone as well as in his own defensive zone. He seemed to quickly recognize where his stick should be and how he could position his body in order to maximize defensive impact. There was more than one occasion where he showed good timing and awareness to step into the neutral zone and break up an opposing rush with an active stick.