• Patrik Nilsson drives American growth for Adidas

Standing in the locker room at Sherwood Ice Arena after lacing up his skates, Patrik Nilsson describes his style of play: setting up his linemates for passes, predicting where an errant puck will bounce, and anticipating an unfolding play.

In other words, the modus operandi of The Great One, Wayne Gretzky?

"Yeah, sort of," Nilsson says.

With anyone else, that may have sounded boastful.

But Nilsson had just finished explaining that he was too small and too slow to play at a competitive level beyond his high school years in his native Sweden.

But digging more deeply into that background reveals that Nilsson, as a 16-year-old, played on the Stockholm-area club team, Stocksunds IF, that won the Swedish national championship for that age group in 1980. In 1982, the club finished second in the 18-and-younger category.

Four of Nilsson's teammates went on to play in the National Hockey League. One of them, Tommy Albelin, played from 1987 to 2006 in the NHL, winning the Stanley Cup with the New Jersey Devils in 1995 and 2003.

Nilsson, though, adopted the Toronto Maple Leafs as his favorite team, noting that it once employed one of the greatest Swedes of them all, Mats Sundin, who led Sweden to Olympic gold in hockey in 2006.

Watching Nilsson's offense line at work, it's clear he and his linemates, center Jeff McGillis and winger Lee Walter are versed in the basics stickhandling, skating and position hockey. The troika also are the top three scorers in the Silver-level league.

Nilsson really is Gretzky-like, says McGillis, the league's leading scorer and an Adidas America category manager for football.

"He would rather set somebody up for the score rather than scoring himself."

With his other linemate, Walter, that is significant attribute for Nilsson.

Because Walter, in his work life, is a product category manager.

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