Has excellent vision and hands to make plays.Ģ3. Jack Hughes, C, Northeastern (NCAA): Slight of frame (6-foot, 165 pounds), but extremely agile. The poise in his game is greatly appreciated, but at times you would like to see decisions made quicker. Conor Geekie, C, Winnipeg Ice (WHL): Makes plays you don’t typically see made by someone his size (6-foot-4, 205 pounds). Will be leaned on heavily by Slovakia at the world juniors.ġ0. Juraj Slafkovsky, LW, TPS Turku (Liiga): Picked up his first goal in Liiga play at the start of the month.
Can evade defenders with good puck skills and has the confidence to make plays at the men’s top level.ĩ. David Jiricek, D, HC Plzen (Extraliiga): Is effective from the point in, finding the best way to get pucks through to the net. Danila Yurov, RW, Magnitogorsk (KHL): Similar to his countryman listed above, Yurov has a power element to his game, he competes well in all areas, but doesn’t have the same elite finishing ability as Miroshnichenko. Logan Cooley, C, USNTDP: Is just one of two first-year draft eligibles invited to USA Hockey’s WJC camp. He currently leads the league with 41 points in 25 games.Ħ.
While he may not be quite ready for top six minutes in the U20s, his sights will be set on the WHL scoring and league titles. Matthew Savoie, C, Winnipeg Ice (WHL): Surely will be fired-up for not being named to Canada’s WJC camp roster. Isaac Howard, LW, USNTDP: Killed it at the Five Nations in Switzerland and the momentum from that event has carried forward with points in nine of 10 games.ĥ. The WJC comes at the perfect time to get back up to speed, closer to his age group.Ĥ. Joakim Kemell, LW, JYP (Liiga): Missed some time due to injury, but has come back into JYP’s lineup playing big minutes (12 goals, 18 points in 18 games). Ivan Miroshnichenko, LW, Omsk (VHL): Combines the assets of a power and skill game with an elite goal-scorer’s finishing ability.ģ. 51 has put up multi-point efforts in four of his past five games, just in time to leave for Canada’s WJC camp.Ģ. Shane Wright, C, Kingston Frontenacs (OHL): Where there may have been concerns regarding scoring totals, No. Here’s our December top 32 rankings for the 2022 NHL Draft.ġ. What does all of this mean? Well, it’s still early, and there’s a lot of runway leading up to the draft in July, but, for the first time in a long-time, we may see teams bend a little on talent to procure size. Oddly, only one of them is a defenceman, Moose Jaw’s Denton Mateychuk, who is listed at 5-foot-11, 188 pounds. In the November release of NHL Central Scouting’s Players to Watch list, nine of 26 A-listed players were under six feet. Even those hovering in the six-foot range such as third overall Mason McTavish, or Ottawa’s 10th overall pick Tyler Boucher, or Cole Sillinger (12th to Columbus) all checked-in at over 200 pounds.
In fact, only one player in the top 10 of the 2021 class, William Eklund (San Jose, ninth overall), and six players in the first round were sub-six-foot players. The top two prospects in our rankings are both listed at 6-foot-1, 185 pounds, which isn’t small per se, but does pale in comparison to the 6-foot-6 Owen Power who was selected first overall by Buffalo in 2021, or the 6-foot-4 Simon Edvinsson, whom the Red Wings selected with the sixth overall pick, or even 6-foot-6 netminder Sebastian Cossa, Detroit’s second first round pick at the 15th overall selection last summer.
Having said all that, when looking at the upper-end of the 2022 NHL draft class, size is notably absent. And while the Presidents' Trophy is nice, I can’t remember the last time the guys in white gloves travelled the world with that trophy. The post-season is a completely different animal. The impact of size is mitigated in the regular season, where the grind of an 82-game schedule combined with league-wide travel doesn’t allow for playoff-like intensity. While there is a place in the game for the smaller player, size still matters. Up front they were referred to as “speedy, skilled players,” while on the back, smaller players were, and to some extent still are, referred to as, “new-aged defencemen.” For a long stretch of time, fuelled mostly by rule changes and a gentler game, smaller players were all the rage. Several scouts I’ve talked to harken to the 2021 Stanley Cup Final and how both Tampa Bay and Montreal were big and heavy, especially on the back end. It’s ironic how size has made a resurgence when speaking about prospects.