Jakub Kovar - Biography

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Jakub Kovar Biography

 

Jakub Kovar was born in the Czech Republic’s capital and largest city to his parents Martin and Andrea Kovar, his mother was an English teacher and his father ran the family’s restaurant, but had a degree in engineering. Jakub has 2 siblings, his sister Adela, and his brother Lukas, both of them are older than him, Adela by 4 years, and Lukas by only a year and a half. Jakub and Lukas have always been huge sports fans, it's never mattered which sport either, basketball, hockey, soccer, you name it, they probably played it or watched it on TV. The boys would spend hours talking to each other about their favorite players, stats, who they thought was the best team that year etc. It was hockey however, that the boys loved the most, they lived just down the road from a rink and the Prague Phantoms arena, which they held season tickets to, so they had lots of opportunity to play hockey or watch their favorite team in person. When they weren’t completing their schoolwork or watching hockey, they played in their driveway, taking turns being the goalie and skater, and pretending they were Phantoms players competing for the continental cup, which they substituted with a laundry basket. Jakub began playing organized hockey at 6 years old, and it was clear from the very start that he had something that not every kid had. Jakub had a drive that not many others his age had as a young hockey player, he was always volunteering to be the one to demonstrate drills for the coach, always willing to forecheck and backcheck on every play and always willing to make the extra pass so that his team could come out on top. Jakub practiced as much as he could, even asking coaches of teams far above his age level if he could practice with them, anything that could get him slightly better at hockey, he was willing to try. He and his brother were quickly some of the best youth hockey players in the Czech Republic, practicing with the national team. 

When Jakub was 14, his family had to move to the USA, Seattle in particular, when his father got a job opportunity there. Once again, when Jakub began to play hockey in Seattle, coaches quickly realized there was something special about his play, and he was scouted by some of the best travel teams in the nation. Jakub’s amazing skills were evident to WHL scouts as he quickly shot up draft boards for one of the best junior hockey leagues in the world, and the first step towards his dream of playing in the VHL, the greatest hockey league in the world. When he was 16 he was selected 4th overall in the WHL bantam draft by the Seattle Thunderbirds. Jakub Kovar was quickly one of the best players in the WHL and all of the major junior level, despite his size he played with no fear, willing to fight anyone for the right to have the puck, and his stickhandling and offensive vision was on another level. In his first season with the Seattle Thunderbirds he finished with 102 points, good enough for 8th in the entire league, and helped lead the Seattle Thunderbirds to the playoffs as the 5th seed. However, the lights and pressure were just too much for the young Kovar, and he greatly underperformed expectations in the playoffs, only securing 2 assists as his team fell in 5 games. This heartbreaking defeat in the playoffs fueled Kovar to work even harder than he had ever before in the offseason. In his 2nd and final season in the WHL, he scored 123 points, second-most in the league, and was part of an absolutely stacked Thunderbirds roster that was the second best team in the league heading into the playoffs. This time, Kovar did not fold under the pressure, he elevated his game to a higher level in the playoffs, he scored 41 points in the playoffs, which led his team and the entire league in the playoffs, which helped his team win the Ed Chynoweth Trophy, and him win the Playoff MVP Trophy.

Despite how great Kovar’s play was in the WHL, there was very little interest from VHLM teams as the S97 dispersal draft came closer. His potential was quite high, but his smaller size and low floor lead many teams to believe he could be a massive bust and not pan out to his potential. The Philadelphia Reapers took a chance on Kovar with the 32nd overall pick in the draft and Kovar’s professional career started out quite rough. The Reapers were not a very good team and Kovar was quite bad, only scoring 36 points in 72 games and being a -46, but he showed many signs of improvement as his play began to take a turn for the better. His hard work was vindicated when in the offseason he was taken 11th overall by the Warsaw Predators in the VHL Entry Draft. In his second season, he and the Reapers were much improved, as they finished 2nd in the VHLM and Kovar had 79 points and 36 goals. There seems to be a lot more to come from the rest of Jakub Kovar’s career, as he looks to end up as one of the VHL greats when his time in the league is up.

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