Cam York’s season with Michigan is over

We’ve got a bit more bad news to deliver here, gang. The Michigan Wolverines, after receiving an at-large bid to get into the NCAA Tournament and being slated to kick things off with a game this afternoon against Minnesota Duluth, have been removed from the tournament due to a positive COVID test in their Tier 1 group. UMD will be given a no contest and advance to the semi-final.

And this, it goes without saying, is a really tough blow for a team that, outside of a two-week shutdown of the entire university’s athletics program, remained unscathed by COVID related issues.

This means, of course, that Flyers’ prospect Cam York’s season has come to an end. He closed out his sophomore season with four goals and 14 assists in 22 games, good for fifth in team scoring and first in scoring by defensemen.

So does that mean that we’re going to see him with the Flyers soon? That’s a somewhat difficult question.

York can sign with the Flyers at any time now (and given the season he had, it wouldn’t be surprising in the least to see him turn pro now), they can easily sign him and have his contract not kick in until next season, and just have that bit of housekeeping taken care of. The Flyers also do have one more contract spot available for this season before they hit that 50 contract maximum, so they do have the option to get him up with the NHL squad as soon as possible. Now, are they going to want to burn a year of his contract to throw him into the mess that this team is at present? That’s hard to say.

The other option would be, if they want to get him in for some professional games this season, to have him join the Phantoms on an Amateur Tryout. The Phantoms have a bit of an excess of defensemen at this point, though with Samuel Morin up with the Flyers now, Wyatte Wylie out with injury, and the possibility remaining open that Mason Millman could return to the OHL at some point, there’s less of a logjam at the moment. It certainly couldn’t hurt to get him into the rotation and see if he can earn himself a permanent spot in the lineup in advance of what would be his true first professional season.

There are a few moving parts here, and we can add to that the possibility that York may have to complete some kind of quarantine after returning to Ann Arbor, so we likely shouldn’t expect to see any news on this front coming immediately. But it’s certainly something worth keeping an eye on over the next little bit here.