Frank DiChiara is deserving of an opportunity at the next level.

A point-per-game stat line for the Reading Royals star forward — including a career-high 22 goals in just 59 games — has unquestionably put the big winger in line for his first opportunity at the American Hockey League level.

But, at 27 years old and set to return to the ECHL for a fourth consecutive season, the clock is ticking for the Ronkonkoma, NY, native to get the long-overdue call.

“It’s pretty tough,” DiChiara told FloHockey. “I had a pretty good year last year, and thought maybe I was deserving of a call-up at some point. You don’t know what certain teams are looking for at certain times. I think this summer for me personally, what I really wanted to do was just kind of focus and build off of what I had last year, and come back to Reading and hit the ground running. Playing for ‘K-Mac’ (head coach Kirk MacDonald) and ‘Luuks’ (assistant Nick Luukko), they’re two great coaches with a lot of great connections. So, I know that if I go back and continue to produce and play well and be patient, I think I definitely will get an opportunity.”

The Yale graduate said he’d be “lying through his teeth” if he said an AHL call-up wasn’t on his mind, but certainly isn’t being selfish about it. 

Anything but, actually. 

He pointed to the opportunity his Reading teammate, Ralph Cuddemi — who was in a similar situation with big ECHL production over multiple years without a call-up — got when he earned his way to an 11-game stay with the Montreal Canadiens’ top minor-league affiliate in Laval last season.

“It was his fourth year in the league, and he came to Reading, had a really great start, and he earned it,” DiChiara said. “I’m pretty confident where if I do the same things I did last year in terms of my play and doing the little things right and being a good teammate and good voice for the younger guys, hopefully I will get that opportunity next year.”

While it seems inevitable that the call will finally come for someone who checks all of the boxes it takes to succeed at the next level, MacDonald will certainly make the most of his time with DiChiara while he remains in Reading, and was quick to pounce on him after division rival Worcester let him go after the 2017-18 season.

“He’s always been a skill guy — he was a really good player at Yale, too — and he wasn’t bad in Worcester, but they weren’t interested in bringing him back,” MacDonald told FloHockey.

“That was more because of the affiliation and he didn’t feel like he was going to get an opportunity, so credit to (former Railers head coach) Jamie Russell in doing him a favor and letting him become unrestricted instead of holding him back. He came here, and we didn’t have a ton of guys from our affiliation the first year he was with us, and he got to play a lot; he got some secondary power play time and was pretty good, but was always in a hurry. He’d get the puck and it would look like ‘hot potato’ at times. He did a really good job this year, and you could see it from the first day of training camp, where he allowed the game to happen and started to realize you have a lot more time and space on the ice than he thought. 

“He was arguably one of the best power play guys in the league last year where he played in that Ovi spot on the back door, and he just continued to get better. He’s a great person, great in the locker room. You pull for guys like that. But we had a top-five power play last year, and he was a huge reason for that. Credit to him, he put in the work to get better, and you hope you see a guy like that get an opportunity at the next level at some point.”

Mike Ashmore has 17 years of experience covering professional and college sports. You can follow him on all social media channels at @mashmore98.