A thick and strong offensive-minded blueliner. Loik is a smooth skater, with long powerful strides. His backward skating is also fluid and fast. He looks balanced on his skate and joins the rush frequently. He likes to skate with the puck on breakouts. He has decent hand skills, but really protects the puck well. His passes on the breakouts are crisp and accurate. On the power play he moves the puck and sees the open lanes well. Has an effective shot that he consistently gets on net. His physicality is very noticeable: he battles hard in the corners, roughs up opposing players a lot, isn’t scared of being hit, engages in contact and looks like he enjoys it. He is mean in front of the net, using his strength or stick to make attackers pay. He makes some bad decisions at times when he has too much time with the puck — instead of just moving the puck or skating with it, he hesitates and can be pressed by forecheckers. Overall his major weakness is that he makes some questionable decisions with the puck that lead to opponent scoring chances. His defensive desire is good, and while he is not a shutdown defenseman, he keeps players to the outside and is willing to block shots. He needs to refine his positioning and learn not to run around his own end so much. (May 2015)