Would you look at that, we’re back with a bit more World Junior talk. Yesterday, we spent some time checking in with the trio of Flyers prospects who played in this year’s tournament, and today we’re back and ready to pivot to begin thinking already about the 2025 draft. There aren’t heaps of underage prospects playing in a tournament like this, but we did see a handful of players expected to go in this year’s draft making their tournament debuts, and some making really strong statements in those debuts, at that.
Will any of these players be ones that the Flyers will be in the mix to draft? It’s much too early to say that with any conclusiveness, but at the same time, it’s never too early to start familiarizing ourselves with some of these big names. Let’s get into it.
James Hagens, C, USA
7 GP, 5G, 4A, 9P
We’ll kick things off with the player who’s still the presumptive first-overall pick in this draft. There was some noise coming into this tournament about a couple of the Canadian skaters closing the gap on him in this race, but Hagens did well to pull away again with his performance.
Hagens had, in short, an insane tournament for a draft-eligible player. He was definitely placed in a position to succeed — playing top minutes at 5-on-5 and on the power play on a line with Ryan Leonard and Gabe Perreault, who are both hugely skilled players and also his linemates back at Boston College — but he still made the most of that opportunity. Hagens began the tournament with a two-goal, four point game against Germany and finished it fourth on the team in points, trailing his linemates by one and Cole Hutson by two. His skill with the puck was readily apparent, how it just seems to follow him, and he stepped up for the US in some big moments. There’s not much more you could have hoped to see from him in this tournament, he was effective in his role and was a key part of that second consecutive gold medal win.
Porter Martone, RW, Canada
3 GP, 1G, 0A, 1P
In contrast, it wasn’t exactly a world-beating tournament for Martone, who’s so far projected to go in the top-five of this year’s draft. As a younger player — as is often the case on these Canadian teams — his role was somewhat limited, as he was a healthy scratch for two of Canada’s five games, and he was playing bottom-six minutes generally when he wasn’t in the lineup. He’s been a big offensive contributor so far this season at the junior hockey level, but that offense didn’t manifest for him in a big way in this tournament (though he did show some flash on the power play when he got a look there, scoring a big tip-in goal). And that sort of alludes to what made this a difficult tournament for Martone — he showed a few flashes of eye-catching offense, but he couldn’t really sustain it, and indeed at times also looked like he was struggling with the pace of play. Now, how much of this was just an individual problem and how much of it was the overall team struggles holding him back, it’s hard to say. This isn’t massive red flags going up about Martone’s game after one tough tournament, but there are certainly some questions beginning to be posed.
Matthew Schaefer, D, Canada
2 GP, 1G, 1A, 2P
As tough as this tournament was for some of the skaters, particularly on the Canadian team, it was an even tougher one for Schaefer. But not in the way you’d think. Schaefer was eased into things a bit through Canada’s opening game, but as we was given some more minutes to work with, he really took off. Through the first three and a half periods of action he played in, he was pretty comfortably Canada’s best defender, getting involved nicely in all areas — solid in his defensive positioning, a huge boost in transition, comfortable looking in both power play and penalty kill roles, and involved nicely in some offensive chances. Everything seemed to be clicking really nicely for him right up until he went flying into the net in his second game and broke his collarbone, ending his tournament (and putting him out of action for at least three months). Really tough luck for one of the most promising prospects in this class.
Victor Eklund, C/W, Sweden
7 GP, 2G, 4A, 6P
Moving beyond this very top of the top prospect group, Eklund, expected to go somewhere in the mid-late first round, had himself a very good tournament and did well to help raise his stock early in these pre-draft conversations. They may have fallen short of collecting any hardware this time around, but the Swedes still found a nice bit of success in this tournament, and Eklund was a key part of this. His skill game featured well, and his pair of goals were nice ones, but equally notable was the sort of details focused side of his game as well. The skill can certainly overwhelm impressions in these tournaments, but it shouldn’t get lost that Eklund brought quite a stable, hardworking game in the way that he was checking and positioning on the defensive side. It’s a well-rounded game that’s nice to see in kids this young, and a strong impression made by Eklund on the whole.
Luka Radivojevič, D, Slovakia
5 GP, 0G, 2A, 2P
Also not to get lost in the mix here was the quietly pretty solid play of Slovakian defender Radivojevič. He got a reasonable workload in this tournament, getting looks in all situations and averaging about 17 and a half minutes a game. He showed nicely as a puck mover, and distributed well from the point in both power play and even strength settings. His skating and speed aren’t overwhelming strengths of his, which meant that there were some instances where he got beat initially laterally or in a one-on-one footrace, but he recovered well in those types of moments, which is worth something as well. His game isn’t overly dynamic, but there are some good tools and some good smarts there. He’s projecting as a mid-rounder so far, and he had the tournament to match that.
Jack Ivankovic, G, Canada
1 GP, 24 SVS, .923 SV%, 1.85 GAA
On the goaltending side, there wasn’t a ton of action for Ivankovic in this tournament, as he was backing up a more experienced Carter George, but he did still get in for one game (Canada’s shootout loss to Latvia) and it was a reasonably solid showing for him. Both of the Latvian goals scored in regulation came on the power play, and neither of them saw Ivankovic just getting beaten cleanly. He didn’t see an overly high volume of shots across the board, but he settled in nicely at even strength, generally looking pretty comfortable, and battling well on the whole. The result didn’t go his way in the end, but he looked excellent — up until the end — in the shootout. All in all, this is a difficult tournament for underage goaltenders, but Ivankovic held up reasonably well in spite of this. Will one decent showing in international play do much for his overall draft stock? Probably not, but it was still nice to see him perform well, and get his name on the radar of prospect watchers early.
