After a nearly four month dry spell on the recruiting trail, the Huskies garnered a verbal commitment from Jackson Dorrington on Thursday night. Dorrington is a 2004 birth year defenseman from North Reading, MA.
He played last season at Cushing Academy, an elite prep school in Massachusetts. He is the younger brother of Max Dorrington (incoming freshman at St. Lawrence), and is a distant cousin of the late Art Dorrington, the first Black player to sign an NHL contract. NHL.com had an excellent article of the brothers carrying on their cousin’s legacy in the modern hockey world.
A left-shot defenseman, Dorrington stands 6-foot-1 along the blue line, and weighs in at 185 pounds, showing collegiate-ready size at only 16 years old. He is eligible for the 2022 NHL Draft, and has signed on to play for the Boston Jr Bruins of the National Collegiate Development Conference in 2020-21. He was a second round (19th overall) pick by Des Moines in the 2020 United States Hockey League draft, as well as an eleventh round (186th overall) pick by Halifax in the 2020 Quebec Major Junior Hockey League draft.
In his last season at Cushing as a sophomore, Dorrington put up 27 points (9 goals) in 34 games, showing a playmaking and goal-scoring touch from the back end. “Puck mover with good size” is one of the more common descriptors of Dorrington’s game when you research him, and it’s also a pairing that professional scouts crave. The modern NHL defenseman is one who can play physical while also being effective moving the puck and generating offense, and Dorrington is proving from a young age that he fits that mold.
Neutral Zone scouting, one of the most reliable in terms of collegiate recruit information and rankings, had Dorrington ranked as the 22nd American-born ’04 player (out of 250), and multiple Neutral Zone scouts considered him to be a snub from the US National Team Development Program. “Smooth, strong, smart” were how they summed up there quick report. In May 2019, NZ head scout Mark Bilotta echoed those statements watching a then-freshman Dorrington compete in the Massachusetts Hockey Final 40 National Camp evaluations. As recently as two weeks ago, Mark Divver of the New England Hockey Journal (and formerly The Providence Journal covering Providence and Brown) observed a Boston Jr Bruins game and called Dorrington “promising.”
Dorrington also participated in the 2020 Beantown Summer Classic, playing on the all-Black-and-Hispanic team coached by former NHLers Bryce Salvador and Mike Grier that won the Pro Division this year. Other players on that team included current Huskies alternate captain Jordan Harris, incoming freshman James Davenport, and former Huskies commit Ross Mitton.
Between his hockey acumen, his production on the ice, the upside that scouts are raving about, and the testimonials from his Cushing program and former coaches about the quality of student, leader, and person he is, it seems that Northeastern landed a future star in Jackson Dorrington. Huskies fans who follow the recruiting trail have to be salivating at the prospect of Dorrington, ’03 Michael Bevilacqua, and ’04 Vinny Borgesi running the Huskies blue line for years to come, tormenting opponents with their blend of skill, speed, and size.
Dorrington will be eligible to arrive at Northeastern in 2022, the year he is eligible for the NHL Draft. We expect if he plays the 2020-21 season with Boston, he would play one season with Des Moines in the USHL before matriculating in the Fall of 2022, likely with Borgesi to usher in a new era of Huskies defensemen.
Congratulations to Jackson and his family on his commitment to Northeastern. We are excited to watch him over the next two seasons as we anticipate his arrival to Matthews Arena!