Monday FEATURE: Rempe Working Hard With Wolf Pack

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If you've seen the Hartford Wolf Pack play this season, you've probably noticed #32. That is rookie forward Matt Rempe, who stands at 6-foot-7 and is probably close to pushing 7-feet tall on skates.

He's one of the tallest players in American Hockey League (AHL) this season, with only Toronto Marlies forward Curtis Douglas (6'9) and Rockford IceHogs defenseman Louis Crevier (6'8) being listed taller than Rempe on the league's website - though there are a handful of other players across the league also listed at 6'7.

Simply put, he stands out at first sight because he's taller than everyone else on the ice - sometimes by a considerable margin. His teammate Bobby Trivigno, for instance, is a full foot shorter than him.

"Yeah, you look at him...fourth line right winger, you think 6-7, 220. Big dummy? He's not, he's the farthest thing from it," Wolf Pack head coach Kris Knoblach said of Rempe's size not labeling him as a one-dimensional player.

The New York Rangers took a flier on Rempe, so to speak, during the 2020 NHL Draft - selecting him in the sixth round after he put up 31 points (12 goals, 19 assists) in his rookie season in the WHL with the Seattle Thunderbirds.

After a pandemic-shortened 2020-21 season saw Rempe appear in just eight games with the Thunderbirds, he had a solid showing this past season in Seattle - tallying 17 goals and adding six assists in 56 games prior to turning pro this fall.

"Last year in the WHL I was the biggest guy, and now it's pro hockey," Rempe told InsideAHLHockey.com Sunday. "Like, I'm 20 and I'm going against 30-some year-old men. I want to bring the physical edge, and I want to hang in there with anyone. I think that I'm just adjusting more and more. I feel more comfortable every game so I'm really enjoying it."

Sunday in Hershey, Rempe found himself dropping the gloves and going toe-to-toe at center ice with one of the AHL's toughest customers in Bears' captain Dylan McIlrath.

"He was talking to me a little bit [Saturday night], so I kind of thought maybe something would happen [Sunday] and then off that face-off he says 'you wanna go?' so we went," Rempe explained of how the bout came to be. "He's one hell of a tough customer. I have so much respect for him. I thought it was a great fight. It was awesome."

Knoblach and Rempe's Wolf Pack teammates were quite impressed the way he stood in there and more than held his own against McIlrath.

"That's a big, tall order," Knoblach said of Rempe dropping his gloves with McIlrath. "And, you know, it's just a young guy coming into the league, but he felt the way our team had been playing he felt it was necessary."

"Big Remps has been tough for us all year. He's fought some big boys, and he'll probably keep doing that," WolfPack forward Will Cuylle said of Rempe's ability to stick up for his teammates and not be afraid of taking on the biggest/strongest player the opposition has to offer. "It definitely got the boys going on the bench. I'll say that."

Outside of being big and physical, Rempe is a unique prospect in that his size doesn't prevent him from making an impact in other areas of the game.

"He's a very intellectual guy," Knoblach said of Rempe, adding, "He's worked so hard at his game, and he does have skill - he can make some plays. So There's another guy that when he has success, the players on the team really get excited for it because they like him.  They know how much hard work he puts in and they hope that he has success."

Through his first 11 games, Rempe has just one point - his first pro goal which came on November 16 against Charlotte. But he's not too worried about putting up points so long as he's playing well.

On Sunday, for instance, he made a nice move to shake loose from a Bears' defender coming down the left wing on his first shift of the contest and fired a hard shot that beat Bears' goalie Zach Fucale but clanked hard off the post.

"I've been hitting quite a few posts," Rempe told InsideAHLHockey.com, "so the first one was nice and I just want to keep that rolling. I don't care about the points - like, whatever happens happens - I'm gonna try to play good hockey every night."

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