The Philadelphia Flyers have a bounty of wingers who are on the smaller side, but overcome their lack of physical height in the way that they approach the game with some aggressive forechecking and the ability to move around the ice well enough. So, how about another one? Max WestergÄrd comes in at No. 24 of our 2026 Top 25 Under 25 ranking after an impressive first season as a Flyers prospect.
No. 24: Max WestergÄrd
2025-26 Primary League/Team:Â Frolunda HC U20 (U20 Nationell)
2025-26 Statistics:Â 9 G, 21 A, 30 Pts
Age as of 9/15/2026:Â 19
Acquired Via:Â 2025 NHL Draft â Round 5, Pick 132
How did WestergĂ„rdâs 2025-26 season go?
It might be a little too much to call WestergĂ„rdâs 2025-26 season a âbreakout seasonâ but itâs hard not to. He went from a player who was drafted in the fifth round just months before his campaign actually got started, to someone who has rightfully solidified himself as a very good NHL prospect. Only the truest of draft freaks knew his name before the Flyers selected him last June, and now we think he rocks.
As part of the legendary Frolunda program, WestergĂ„rd had a year where he bounced around from league to league a little too often than anyone would like, but itâs clear that they care about his development.
For the first handful of months, WestergÄrd would go back and forth between the U20 Nationell junior league for Frolunda and the SHL roster. One game here, a two-game weekend there, and then back to playing with his teenaged peers, and then a game in the SHL or the Champions Hockey League, and then back to juniors.
WestergĂ„rd regularly showed that he was too good for juniors â he did show that by scoring 30 points in 20 games â but he then got under 10 minutes of ice-time in the SHL, which didnât really help. It wasnât until the World Juniors where he really got to show off.
Weâre not regularly watching SHL or U20 Nationell games, so this was one of our first experiences watching full games of WestergĂ„rd and he certainly impressed. He finished the tournament with four points in seven games, so not lighting the world on fire, but he would regularly put defenders on their heels with some insane forechecking work and just show how he can impact the game on and off the puck.
After that, Frolunda tried to not have him waste his talents in the junior league. He was loaned to HockeyAllsvenskanâs Bjorkloven (the second tier in Swedish pro hockey) to get more opportunity. That lasted five games (where he played over 12 minutes in three of them) and aside from a couple SHL games where he barely played, he was back in juniors full time.
It was in the U20 Nationell playoffs where he really popped off, with 23 points in 15 games and a trip to the final round against Vaxjo. WestergÄrd and Frolunda unfortunately lost, but he at least got to show off.
WestergĂ„rdâs stock has clearly risen compared to where we were a year ago, since we didnât know what to expect. But after this season, it also leaves him in a weird space between leagues, since he scored a bunch in juniors and then didnât score a single point in the 23 games of pro hockey he got to (barely) play in.
What are we expecting from WestergÄrd this season?
Itâs, well, complicated. We donât know where WestergĂ„rd is going to play next season, but the expectation (or at least the hope) is that he plays in a pro league for the entire season and establishes him enough to build on the hype that he constructed during the last several months.
If WestergĂ„rd is back in juniors to start the year, it will be a disappointment. Heâs clearly shown that he is too good for that level of play and it wouldnât challenge him at all. And since itâs not some CHL-esque rule of having to play out your years there if youâre not heading to college, why not start the season with him in the SHL and see how it goes?
Flyers assistant general manager Brent Flahr mentioned that some NCAA schools were really pestering WestergĂ„rd to commit to their program earlier this summer. The Flyers prospect decided to not come to North America just yet and is hoping to make the SHL team. And obviously, the Flyers do too, as Flahr mentioned. He even went on to say that he hopes that if he doesnât make the SHL, that heâs loaned to another HockeyAllsvenskan team for the entire year, to keep him out of juniors.
Since there is a good relationship between Frolunda and the Flyers, we have to imagine that that will be the case and WestergĂ„rdâs junior days are behind him.
With that in mind, it really is a mystery how he will perform. You can easily see his work ethic being depended on in the SHL as a middle-six winger for Frolunda, and him scoring half a point per game â that would be considered a big jump in development. Or, him struggling a bit and keeping that same role he had in the Allsvenskan, and never really coming out of it.
Maybe more than most other Flyers prospects, there is a giant spectrum of outcomes for WestergÄrd next season.
What do we think WestergĂ„rdâs ultimate NHL upside is?
Thankfully, the path to Westergard making an impact in the NHL is extremely clear when it comes to the Flyers. We have seen similar players like Denver Barkey already come and be that nose-to-the-grindstone, middle-six winger type that exceeds expectations and will eventually cause some fans to nerd out about all their off-puck work.
Both Barkey and WestergĂ„rd have similar ceilings offensively, but we havenât seen it as much from WestergĂ„rd as we got to see Barkey light up the OHL with the London Knights. The most important thing is that WestergĂ„rd has the brain to go along with the aggressiveness. That can take him so far.
Itâs hard to put a pin on his exact upside, but there is certainly a world where he is kind of what we hoped Oskar Lindblom could be, before his cancer diagnosis that caused his career to end early. Someone that might score just 30 points but also kill penalties and be this playoff-style performer who will work harder and be smarter than anyone else on the ice.
There is still a lot of runway for WestergĂ„rd to eventually become that. The dude doesnât even turn 19 years old until early September.
How we voted
⊠At No. 24
| Brad | Cole | Evan | Jason M | Kelly | Kurt | Maddie | Readers | Ryan G | Thomas |
| Brek Liske | Carter Amico | Martin Psohlavec | Maksim Sokolovskii | Noah Powell | Aleksei Kolosov | Helge Grans | Aleksei Kolosov | MaxWestergard | Ty Murchison |
For Max WestergÄrd:
| Brad | Cole | Evan | Jason M | Kelly | Kurt | Maddie | Readers | Ryan G | Thomas |
| 20 | 18 | N/A | N/A | N/A | N/A | 23 | N/A | 24 | 15 |
