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Calgary Flames Prospect Roundup: Playoff-bound prospects
Sergei Belski-Imagn Images

It’s that time of the year again when the junior and college leagues’ regular seasons come to an end. It’s an exciting year for Calgary Flames fans as many of their prospects punched a ticket to the postseason. There’s plenty more hockey to come!

There weren’t many games this week, but Zayne Parekh and Etienne Morin still managed to collect five points in two games. Matvei Gridin also picked up four points in two games.

The Flames signed a shiny new college goaltending prospect—not that they need one with Dustin Wolf between the pipes—after reports pointed us toward college free agent forward Carter King.

There’s so much to talk about this week. Let’s take a look!

Welcome to The Win Column’s Calgary Flames prospect update. Each week, we’ll take a dive into how the Flames’ prospects have done in their respective leagues. We have defined a prospect as a skater who has played fewer than 65 NHL games and is younger than 25 years of age.

All data is from QuantHockey and EliteProspects. We also use an NHLe calculator built by Christian Roatis (@Croatis), which is used to estimate a player’s equivalent point total in the NHL based on how they are performing in their respective league. The calculator uses the difficulty of the given league combined with the ease at which a player puts up points to determine the NHLe.

Flames prospect happenings

AHL

  • The Calgary Wranglers split a pair of games with the Coachella Valley Firebirds, going 1–1–0. The scoring is still hard to come by, as the team averaged 2.5 goals per game.
  • Goaltender Waltteri Ignatjew was impressive in his lone appearance, stopping 33 of the 34 shots he faced in a 3–1 win on Friday. He’s up to an 11–7–3 record with a 3.48 goals against average and a 0.889 save percentage.
  • Rory Kerins collected two assists to improve to 50 points in 53 games. This was a beauty of a cross-ice feed:
  • A surprising burst of offence saw Lucas Ciona pick up two points—a goal and an assist. He now has 20 points in 58 games. Nice deflection on Sam Honzek’s shot:
  • Honzek also had two helpers this week. He improved his point totals to 20 in 42 games and is just shy of half a point per game on the year.

Europe

  • Three games for Nikita Okhotyuk and CSKA Moscow in the KHL this week. They went 1–2–0.
  • Okhotyuk—who has seen his ice time dip over the last little while after a strong start to the year—saw between 14:31 to 17:40 time on ice. He recorded two blocked shots and five hits.
  • Through 11 games for Unison-Moscow in the VHL, Daniil Chechelev is 2–4–1 with a 3.61 GAA and a 0.888 SV%.
  • Netminder Yegor Yegorov has split his season among three teams in three different leagues. He seems to have found a home in the MHL with Krylya Sovetov, though. He has a 7–10–1 record with a 3.14 GAA and a 0.904 SV%.
  • Kirill Zarubin boasts the best stats of the Flames’ Russian goalies. He’s 12–9–0 for Mikhailov Academy with a 2.34 GAA and a 0.935 SV% in the MHL.

NCAA

  • The big news out of college hockey for Flames fans this week is the signing of free agent goaltender Owen Say. Playing between the pips for the University of Notre Dame, the 23-year-old has a 10–15–0 record with a 2.82 GAA and a 0.920 SV%.
  • Cade Littler was the only college prospect in action this week. He recorded just one shot on goal in a 4–2 loss that saw the University of North Dakota bow out in the semifinal of the NCHC Frozen Faceoff tournament.
  • Aydar Suniev and UMass are back in action Thursday night to kick off the NCAA Fargo Regional.
  • Penn State University and Arsenii Sergeev hit the ice Friday for the Allentown Regionals.

OHL

  • Blueliner Zayne Parekh picked up five helpers in his last two games to finish the year with 107 points in 61 games. The Saginaw Spirit finished fourth in the OHL’s Western Conference and have a date with the Erie Otters beginning Thursday.
  • Henry Mews was quiet to finish the regular season, failing to hit the scoresheet in his final two games. The Sudbury Wolves finished sixth in the Eastern Conference and will face the Kingston Frontenacs starting Friday.
  • Speaking of the Fronts, Jacob Battaglia had two assists in three games to end the regular season. He finished with 40 goals and 90 points in 68 games. Solid year for the 2024 second-round pick. Bates shows off some defensive prowess on this play, covering for his centreman as his opponents try to turn the play up ice:
  • Luke Misa had three assists in his last two games and finished the year with 34 goals and 85 points in 67 games. The Brampton Steelheads finished fifth in the East and kick off their first-round series against the Oshawa Generals on Friday.

QMJHL

  • The Moncton Wildcats ran away with the QMJHL regular season title, finishing with 108 points. The next closest had 96. They take on the Québec Ramparts starting Friday. Defenceman Etienne Morin added five points in his last two games to finish with 14 goals and 58 points in 62 games. Nice moves to get into prime shooting position:
  • Matvei Gridin finished off strong with two goals and four points in two games. He shows some unbelievable skill and strength on the puck to feed his teammate here:
  • The Shawinigan Cataractes finished third in the QMJHL’s Western Conference and get home-ice advantage for their first-round matchup against the Val-d’Or Drillers. They drop the puck Friday night.

WHL

  • The Medicine Hat Tigers will continue on without forward Andrew Basha for now. Apparently, they’ll need to go on a deep run if he’s to return to the lineup this season. His regular season concluded with nine goals and 29 points in 23 games. The Tigers punched their playoff ticket as the top seed in the WHL’s Eastern Conference.
  • Defenceman Eric Jamieson picked up an assist in his final game, ending the regular season with 36 points in 66 games. The Everett Silvertips finished as the top team in the WHL and will face the Seattle Thunderbirds in the first round starting Friday.
  • Hunter Laing had a goal and three points in his final three games to finish the year with a respectable 48 points in 64 games. Sometimes, you just need a little bit of luck:
  • The Saskatoon Blades finished sixth in the East and take on Axel Hurtig and the Calgary Hitmen in the first round starting Friday.
  • One assist for Hurtig in his final three games, and he finished with 16 points in 55 games. The Hitmen are third in the East and came three points short of the top spot, which went to their division rival.

NHLe Leaderboard

NHLe is a metric used to estimate a player’s offensive output at the NHL level from their point totals in their respective league. Here are the Flames’ current top five (bracketed numbers denote movement from the previous week):

  1. Zayne Parekh: 46.4 (Same)
  2. Rory Kerins: 37.5 (Same)
  3. Aydar Suniev: 35.1 (+1)
  4. Jacob Battaglia: 35.0 (-1)
  5. Luke Misa: 33.6 (Same)

Overall regular season totals for Flames prospects

Forwards

Player Position GP G A P P/GP PIM NHLe Team League
Andrew Basha LW 23 9 20 29 1.26 30 31.2 Medicine Hat Tigers WHL
Jacob Battaglia RW/LW 68 40 50 90 1.32 34 35.0 Kingston Frontenacs OHL
Parker Bell LW 53 6 5 11 0.21 17 8.4 Calgary Wranglers AHL
Lucas Ciona LW 58 7 13 20 0.34 71 13.5 Calgary Wranglers AHL
Matvei Gridin RW 56 36 43 79 1.41 27 32.8 Shawinigan Cataractes QMJHL
Samuel Honzek C/LW 42 7 13 20 0.48 18 19.1 Calgary Wranglers AHL
Trevor Hoskin C/RW 36 12 27 39 1.08 12 N/A Niagara University NCAA
Rory Kerins C/LW 53 27 23 50 0.94 16 37.5 Calgary Wranglers AHL
Adam Klapka RW/LW 33 14 12 26 0.79 50 31.5 Calgary Wranglers AHL
Hunter Laing C 64 25 23 48 0.75 31 18.6 Prince George Cougars/Saskatoon Blades WHL
Jaden Lipinski C 2 0 0 0 0.00 0 0.0 Calgary Wranglers AHL


59 17 41 58 0.98 38 24.3 Vancouver Giants WHL
Cade Littler C 33 7 2 9 0.27 21 9.7 University of North Dakota NCAA
Luke Misa C 67 34 51 85 1.27 6 33.6 Brampton Steelheads OHL
William Stromgren LW 60 13 31 44 0.73 14 29.1 Calgary Wranglers AHL
Aydar Suniev LW 33 18 18 36 1.09 24 35.1 UMass NCAA

Defencemen

Player Position GP G A P P/GP PIM NHLe Team League
Hunter Brzustewicz RHD 61 4 20 24 0.39 8 15.5 Calgary Wranglers AHL
Artyom Grushnikov LHD 53 1 4 5 0.09 24 3.6 Calgary Wranglers AHL
Axel Hurtig LHD 55 5 11 16 0.29 29 7.2 Calgary Hitmen WHL
Eric Jamieson LHD 66 14 22 36 0.55 61 13.6 Everett Silvertips WHL
Joni Jurmo LHD 12 0 0 0 0.00 4 0.0 Calgary Wranglers AHL


12 2 8 10 0.83 4 N/A Rapid City Rush ECHL
Yan Kuznetsov LHD 62 5 14 19 0.31 30 12.4 Calgary Wranglers AHL
Henry Mews RHD 68 14 68 82 1.21 88 32.0 Ottawa 67’s/Sudbury Wolves OHL
Etienne Morin LHD 62 14 44 58 0.94 36 21.9 Moncton Wildcats QMJHL
Nikita Okhotyuk LHD 62 2 7 9 0.15 30 9.9 CSKA Moskva KHL
Zayne Parekh RHD 61 33 74 107 1.75 96 46.4 Saginaw Spirit OHL
Jeremie Poirier LHD 61 4 30 34 0.56 48 22.3 Calgary Wranglers AHL
Ilya Solovyov LHD 49 6 19 25 0.51 24 20.3 Calgary Wranglers AHL

Goalies

Player Position GP GAA SV% Team League
Daniil Chechelev G 11 3.61 0.888 Yunison-Moskva VHL
Waltteri Ignatjew G 22 3.48 0.889 Calgary Wranglers AHL
Owen Say G 27 2.82 0.920 University of Notre Dame NCAA
Arsenii Sergeev G 30 2.66 0.915 Penn State University NCAA
Yegor Yegorov G 4 3.38 0.870 HK Tambov VHL


8 3.07 0.891 MHK Tambov NMHL


20 3.14 0.904 MHK Krylia Sovetov Moskva MHL
Kirill Zarubin G 21 2.34 0.935 AKM Tula MHL

Following the prospects

Staying up to date with the development of prospects is no easy task. Follow along throughout the season for the latest happenings in the entire Flames’ development pipelines!

This article first appeared on The Win Column and was syndicated with permission.

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