Not including players who are expected to join the team this season, the majority of the players who committed since the new staff’s arrival were 16 or younger. Three recruits are projected to join in 2017, with four each in 2018, 2019 and 2020.

The success in landing players went beyond familiarity, Don Granato said.

“It’s more of the connections that Mark has had and the connections that Tony has, and the relationships that we’ve developed within the hockey community over the last 20 years, individually and collectively, that really helped us go from our previous job right into this ... and be extremely active on Day One,” he said. “Because we’re all linked to good people within the industry that we’ve built relationships with that we trust to help us target the right kids to go after.”

Two of the recruits, Koufis from the Chicago Mission and center Tanner Latsch from Twin Lake, Michigan, were 14 when they committed.

Latsch separates himself from his peers with his work ethic, said Mark Beaufait, his coach with the Meijer AAA Bantam Major team. It doesn’t hurt that Latsch is trending toward being a big player — at 14, he’s already 6-foot-1 and between 150 and 160 pounds.