Anthony Romani was selected 162nd overall by the Vancouver Canucks in the 2024 NHL Draft. The forward, who has spent the past five seasons in the OHL, is making the jump to the NCAA for the 2025–26 season. This comes after spending four years with the North Bay Battalion and 29 regular-season games with the Barrie Colts.
Not everything about the 2024–25 season went according to plan for Romani. He dealt with a broken clavicle bone that kept him out of the Battalion’s lineup for three months, until he was traded to the Colts back in January. His first game back from the injury was played with Barrie.
“It’s always hard being away from the game for that long, but I think it was kind of good for me just to battle adversity and just learn some other things off the ice with my mental game and stuff like that,” he said. “I learned that I love hockey a lot. It’s tough to be away from it, just even being around the guys. That’s the best part about playing hockey, just being around your teammates all the time. So I think it sucked being away from them for a bit, but I think just being able to do extra workouts and stuff like that and just build some muscle while I was out was a positive for me.”
With Barrie, Romani registered 19 goals and 11 assists in 29 regular season games, as well as 12 goals and 12 assists in 16 postseason games. This included a 16-game OHL playoffs point streak in which he tallied points in every game.
“Getting traded to Barrie was another obstacle I had to go through. And I mean, I loved it there. I had great teammates, great coaches. It was a really easy transition for myself, and I thought we had a really good team, and we bonded tight. So I thought it was a good year there.”
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As Romani noted, being traded to another team can be difficult, especially if a player has spent their entire career in the league with one team. One part of heading to Barrie that was familiar for Romani was that Riley Patterson, a fellow Canucks prospect, was already on the team. Patterson was selected in the same draft year as Romani, 2024, going in the fourth round to Vancouver.
“He’s a great player. He can do it all, and I got to learn that playing with him in Barrie. Works his hardest every game. Great guy off the ice. He’s easy to play with.”
While Romani faced obstacles during the 2024–25 season, he has expressed his excitement towards heading to his new team at Michigan State University. The forward will join a 2025–26 Michigan State roster that is projected to include players such as NHL prospects Isaac Howard (Tampa Bay Lightning), Trey Augustine (Detroit Red Wings), and Cayden Lindstrom (Columbus Blue Jackets). In 2024–25, Michigan State went 26–7–4 overall, registering an in-conference record of 15–5–4. When asked about his feelings towards his new venture, Romani noted that he is “pumped.
“I think, just kind of a new opportunity,” he told the media in terms of why he decided to move on from the OHL. “It’s a shorter season, so I think it’ll be good for myself to have more time off the ice to do workouts, get strong, and prepare my body for a pro game. So I think that’s kind of a big thing, and also just a next level, playing with older players, and just a new goal.”
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