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Prospects Unlimited 2022-23
Our annual Prospects Unlimited issue returns, with full listings of every NHL team’s system, grades, and a profile on an intriguing youngster. Also, we count down the top 100 21-and-under players in the world.
CAN’T COAST BY
REMEMBER WHEN THE Hanson brothers showed up at the Johnstown bus station from the Iron League, punched out the Coke machine and brought their freakin’ toys with ’em? That might have been the way teams in the ECHL and its predecessor leagues recruited prospects at one time, but things change. Just ask Craig Brush, who has been building ECHL rosters for almost a quarter of a century as the GM-president of the Florida Everblades. The Everblades have won two Kelly Cup championships – including last season’s – and made the league final three other times in the franchise’s 24-year history. First, the fictional Hanson brothers from Slap Shot almost certainly wouldn’t be able to play in the modern-day ECHL. But they wouldn’t be alone. The league has come a long way…
TOP 100 21 AND UNDER: 41-48
41. BRANDT CLARKE POS: D | AGE: 19 Los Angeles Kings (NHL) | Draft: 8th, 2021 (LA) Few are the rushes Clarke has seen that he hasn’t longed to join. His elite offensive awareness and deft playmaking ability have transformative potential for the Kings’ power play and overall blueline contributions. It won’t happen overnight, but Clarke will become key to Los Angeles’ defense – and attack – in short order. 42. DAVID JIRICEK POS: D | AGE: 18 Cleveland Monsters (AHL) | Draft: 6th, 2022 (CLB) His combination of size, physicality and a bomb shot made Jiricek one of the top blueliners in the 2022 draft class, and the Blue Jackets gave him a challenge by sending the Czech teen straight to the AHL. Early on, Jiricek made his presence felt with four points in his first…
BACK TO SCHOOL, EH
EVERY PLAYER IN THE CHL dreams of making the jump from major-junior hockey to the pro ranks. For many, that dream includes a stop in the ECHL or AHL before climbing to the NHL. Increasingly, however, top talents from the OHL, WHL and QMJHL – including NHL draft picks and team captains – are choosing another route: they’re opting to go to university and play in Canada’s USports league. With the increased talent level, USports has quietly become hockey’s “best-kept secret,” and it’s now a legitimate route to the AHL, European pro leagues and even the NHL. “It’s a hidden gem in the hockey world,” said Zach Sawchenko, a 24-year-old goalie who split the 2021-22 season between the AHL’s San Jose Barracuda and NHL’s Sharks. In 2018-19, Sawchenko was a USports second-team all-star…
VEGAS GOLDEN KNIGHTS
ZACH DEAN was already a scoring sensation prior to his NHL draft season. After all, the six-foot center put up 46 points in 57 games en route to all-rookieteam honors in 2019-20 with QMJHL Gatineau. But when Olympiques coach Louis Robitaille arrived that summer, he helped take Dean’s already strong two-way game up a level. It’s not always easy to convince a player whose offensive touch is his selling point to buy in on ‘D,’ but the characteristics that made Dean a coach’s favorite over the years ensured the change to his game would be smooth. It also helped pave the way to Vegas when the Golden Knights made him the No. 30 pick in the 2021 draft. Vegas’ director of player development, Wil Nichol, recognized what sells coaches on Dean. “His…