It feels like we blinked and another month is already in the books. February was a quick one, but a very productive one for portions of the prospect pipeline all over the world. And as the stretch run to end all of their regular seasons are picking up, it’s been major to see who’s beginning to step up for these runs.
Prospects Playing In The NCAA
Things have more or less been status quo over in the world of college hockey, and that’s overwhelmingly a good thing. Cole Knuble and Alex Bump — both with Hobey Baker long list nods, we recall — are fighting it out for the top spot in this ranking of prospect production, and after coming out of January tied, they are… still tied. With each putting up nine-point months of February, they’re continuing to roll along at a very solid clip (albeit in very different contextual settings) and are in a very good spot as far as their momentum is concerned as they stare down the start of the conference playoffs this weekend.
Elsewhere, Devin Kaplan had his most productive month of the season in a short February, and seems to finally be picking up steam after a slightly slow start to the season. He spoke this offseason about the targeted work he’s been doing to develop the power-forward angle of his game, and while that certainly has been a work in progress, the goals look like they’re finally starting to come for him.
Prospects Playing In The AHL
It was a successful month for the Phantoms on a collective level, and despite a bit of flux in the lineup on the veteran side (the injury bug is back again), the prospect group as a whole has provided a nice bit of stability. Olle Lycksell is continuing to produce at a high rate for the Phantoms, and often stepping up even when the rest of the offense is lagging behind. Zayde Wisdom and Jacob Gaucher also had reasonably productive months, and are equally working towards adding some more consistency to their games, which is nice to see.
And then on the back end, the Phantoms are getting consistent contributions from Emil Andrae as he’s continuing to settle in, and indeed is beginning to take off with the high volume of minutes he’s been given to work with, but the really notable contributor among the defense group this past month was Adam Ginning. He more than doubled up on his points on the season over just one month, and has been on an absolute tear. Now, we don’t exactly expect him to maintain this same pace through the rest of the season, but it’s clear that he’s playing with a lot of confidence at the moment, and it’s given him a much needed boost across the board.
Prospects Playing In North American Juniors
The really big production in the pipeline is happening, by and large within the Junior ranks. Denver Barkey is continuing on his absolute tear, maintaining his spot tops in goals and total points. He’s not really at a huge risk of being usurped in either of those departments, but Jett Luchanko is starting to close in on him a bit and really make things interesting. His eight goals and 19 points in February are huge in isolation, but particularly so on a Guelph team which, we remember, sold off pieces ahead of the OHL trade deadline, and isn’t in a position to make a run for the Memorial Cup in the same way that a team like London is. He’s been hugely productive on a not stellar team, and that’s really meaningful.
Elsewhere in the OHL, Noah Powell is starting to really get rolling with Oshawa, adding eight points to his season total after having just six through a longer January. And, granted, this is more or less him meeting expectations — he is an older and more physically mature playing in a junior league, and we’d expect to see him eventually begin to clean up on the scoring front — but it’s still nice to see him clearing that bar of expectations.
And, to close out, the defenders in this group have by and large had a productive month. Oliver Bonk has been continuing to plug along nicely, and Spencer Gill has been picking up steam of late. Carter Sotheran, though, stepped up as the biggest and most notable producer, putting up 12 points on the month and came close to doubling up his points total from the whole of the season in just this last month. And this is, without a doubt, good news for him — after all, he’s playing for a contract at the close of this season, and while his case is still a little uncertain, he’s working to make it more strongly.
Prospects Playing in Europe
Over in Europe, things are still going pretty well for Ilya Pautov. He hasn’t closed back in on that point per game scoring pace, not entirely, but his two goals and six points on the month are still perfectly respectable, and he’s keeping close to that preferred pace. Not too shabby, all things considered.
On top of that, Jack Berglund is back in action. He got going for the first time since taking an injury in World Junior pre-tournament action with three games with Färstead at the J20 level (and collected an assist in each game) before being loaned over to Karlskoga of the Allsvenskan to finish out the season. He’s still waiting for his first point with them, but this level should be a good fit for him.
The Goalie Grab Bag
Not much doing in the goaltending department over the last month. There’s still a pair of players on the shelf, as Eetu Makiniemi remains out with injury (though he is nearing his return), and Aleksei Kolosov still hasn’t gotten in for any starts since the end of January.
As for the active goaltenders, things are still going just fine. Things have stabilized for Zavragin a bit more, and though his numbers have continued to dip ever so slightly, he’s still holding nicely below the 3 GAA mark and above .900 for his save percentage, so that’s good news. And then after a bit of a challenging January, Bjarnason has been rebounding nicely, and he’s moving back towards to the top of the WHL goaltender rankings. There’s still a lot of season left, but he’s moving in the right direction again.
