Warning: extremely long post that will probably take half an hour to read the whole way through. I encourage any discussion down below if you disagree with some of these decisions
With the hawks season coming to an end on top of most of their prospects seasons being over. I thought now would be a good time to do this. For starters, this is a minor adjustment to the Prospect Pyramid, an idea originated by Steve Dangle, where instead of ranking the prospects for your team in a simple 1-whatever list, they are sorted into tiers. He originally did it to save time, but I don't care about saving time, I care about talking about players and this is a convenient way to do it. There are a few changes for what I am calling the "Youth Pyramid''. In order to make a prospect pyramid, a player cannot be an NHL regular. I don't want to limit this to just guys who aren't playing in NHL games and the reason is because everyone young in this organization is gonna hopefully contribute to the future of the organization. Adam Boqvist and Kirby Dach might not be prospects, but that's because they're in the NHL, not because of age. I don't wanna make it seem like we have a "dry cupboard of young talent" just because our young talent is playing in the NHL. So the only rules for being on the youth pyramid are 1. You need to have a birthday of September 15, 1995, and 2. You must be on an NHL contract or have your rights owned by the Hawks. This would make everyone here 25 and under at the start of the next NHL year. It also means that every player on here comes from the 2014 NHL Draft or sooner. The one exception is goaltender. Goalies are very weird and they take longer to develop than most other positions, so for that reason, goalies are given an extra year to stay on the youth pyramid with a max birthday of September 15, 1994, or everyone 26 and under at the start of the next NHL season. The other big change is that there is an extra tier at the top. On most prospect pyramids, there are 6 tiers. Tier 1 is franchise players and most teams usually don't have a tier 1 prospect. Tiers 2-5 are a combination of ceiling and potential to make the NHL and tier 6 are super longshots who are most likely to never make the NHL. On most prospect pyramids, people don't even name the players in tier 6 just calling it "EVERYBODY ELSE". But I want to give a few mentions to the players in tier 6 because I've been watching a lot of these guys and wanna say something about them. On my prospect pyramid it's slightly different. There is an additional top tier which I call "Tier S'', "S" is for "Superstar" and it fits a very specific criteria. All the players in tier S have to be 1. Young enough to be on the youth pyramid and 2. Be bona fide superstars right now. It's more than just having potential to be a superstar, you gotta be a superstar right now. An example of a tier S player is Connor McDavid, he's a superstar right now and he is the age of a prospect despite no longer being a prospect obviously. An example of a Tier 1 player who has potential to make it to tier S is Alexis Lafreniere. He's got Superstar potential, but he isn't there yet so he stays in tier 1 on a rangers youth pyramid. Because there are so few players that qualify as tier S players. I would like to list all the players in the entire NHL who I classify as Tier S players. Leon Draisaitl, Connor McDavid, Jack Eichel, Auston Matthews, Mitch Marner, David Pastrnak, Elias Pettersson, Cale Makar, Charlie McAvoy, Adam Fox. All of these players are either elite first line forwards who produce like top 10 players in the game. Or elite two way #1 defenseman who impacts the game in both the offense and defensive zone. Many elite players and elite prospects will contend to make the S tier, but for now, that's all I've got. With that out of the way, let's get on to the Chicago Blackhawks Youth Pyramid.
First off, all the players under contract/rights with the Hawks who are too old to make this pyramid. Patrick Kane, Jonathan Toews, Dominik Kubalik, David Kampf, Ryan Carpenter, Brandon Pirri, Victor Ejdsell, Vinnie Hinostroza, Brett Connolly, Maxim Shalunov, Connor Murphy, Nikita Zadorov, Duncan Keith, Calvin de Haan, Anton Lindholm, Malcolm Subban, Collin Delia, Matt Tomkins, Ivan Nalimov. Just because these guys don't fit the description of a youth pyramid doesn't mean they won't be part of the team's future. Kane, Toews, Murphy and Kubalik all look like they will be here for a long time and be valuable parts of this team for at least the next 3-5 seasons. But none of them are young enough to fit the pyramid. Moving onto the actual pyramid.
Tier S- Nobody. The Blackhawks do have a bona fide superstar, but Patrick Kane is over the age of 25 so he isn't on this pyramid. I already mentioned earlier the players in the entire NHL who qualify for S Tier and there's only 10 of them. Let's just move on to Tier 1.
TIER 1- Tier 1 is reserved for elite/franchise changing prospects as well as established star players and bona fide first line players. The Blackhawks have one player who fits this and that's Alex Debrincat. Debrincat in his young career is already looking like an elite sniper in the NHL and one of the best draft picks of all time. Taken 39th overall in the SECOND round back in 2016. Debrincat was a small kid who put up a ton of points in the OHL for his first 2 years. The knock on him was two-fold. 1. His size; he was 5'7" and 2. The quality of his linemates. In his rookie season in Erie as a 16 year old, he was on the first line wing of Connor McDavid and in his second season, he was on the wing of Dylan Strome, both of them were top 3 picks in the 2015 NHL Draft and while the McDavid criticism was fair, the Strome one has aged like milk as Debrincat thrives in the NHL while Strome, who got traded to the Hawks a few years ago, has been very hit-or-miss. As for the other criticism, his height, it hasn't mattered. Debrincat might be small but he plays like a man much bigger. He's got a laser of a shot and he's a super underappreciated forechecker, even starting to play penalty kill this season and doing pretty well at it. Brinsky has laughed in the face of the teams who passed on him and certainly made the first Andrew Shaw trade worth it as he was one of the picks we got in that deal. Unlike the Danault trade, this deal with Habs worked out really well for the Red and Black.
TIER 2- Tier 2 is reserved for fringe elite prospects, as well as players who have shown themselves to be current top 6 forwards and current top 4 defenseman. The Blackhawks have 3 players in this tier for me. Kirby Dach, Lukas Reichel and Adam Boqvist.
Kirby Dach is, of course, the third overall pick from 2019, and while many people at the time didn't like it, specifically hoping they draft Turcotte or Byram, he's been great so far. After a 23 point season in 61 games last year, he had 10 in 18 games this year. Considering the circumstances, which are that he wasn’t fully healthy due to coming back early from his wrist injury, over half a point a game in that limited sample while still being hurt is very impressive and points to a good trajectory for the rest of his career. As only a 20 year old, the goal for him is maintaining consistency and truly growing into a capable faceoff guy. He was at 33% last year and he was at 40% this season, that has to keep improving if he wants to be a #1 center of the future for this team. Hopefully he can get it to around 45%. Ryan Nugent-Hopkins was around a 37% faceoff guy as an 18 year old rookie, by his age 26-27 seasons, he was hovering around 45-50%, so it absolutely can be done. It would also help if he came into next season with a full training camp, a solid role with the team, and being fully healthy.
Lukas Reichel is the first and only player in tier 2 who did not play hockey in North America this season. Reichel was drafted 17th overall in the 2020 draft by the Chicago Blackhawks, and it was a unique pick because he was a player the hawks had played against the season before. At the beginning of the 2019-20 season, the Hawks and Flyers made a trip to Europe to play against each other, but they also each played a game against a European team, and the Hawks played against Eisbaren Berlin. While the story of the game was the elite goaltending of Berlin’s veteran netminder Sebastian Dahm, the underlying story was a 17 year old winger in the starting lineup for the Berlin team who lined up to start against Patrick Kane. Lukas Reichel didn’t put up any points that night, but he was certainly a player that Stan Bowman and director of amateur scouting Mark Kelley had their eye on that night. And throughout the rest of their DEL season, Lukas Reichel played really well alongside several former NHL players like Maxim Lapierre, James Sheppard and Landon Ferraro. 24 points in 42 games in his first professional season at the age of 17. Post-draft, he’s improved and in 38 games this season, he had 27 points. Not much of an improvement, but that’s only the point production and it doesn’t show the other stuff going on on the ice, which is very impressive. According to Will Scouch, whos YouTube content you should absolutely check out at Scouching and www.scouching.ca, Lukas Reichel was the top player in his 2020 NHL Draft tracking at generating high danger chances for his team, which is certainly impressive considering he played against men, not junior players like most 2020 prospects, and Eisbaren wasn’t just a clearly superior team in their league, as they finished 4th place out of 14 DEL teams. Of all 2020 eligible prospects, Lukas Reichel came in with an NHL eScore in the 76th percentile. A primary points per 60 in the 95th percentile and a points per 60 in also the 96th percentile. While it was seen as a bit of a reach at the time, it was certainly a fun reach as draft analysts love Lukas Reichel’s play. And by the end of this season, Reichel, now playing center for Eisbaren, won the DEL championship, putting up 5 points in 9 playoff games. The expectation for Reichel is that after he finishes playing in the World Championships with Team Germany, he will sign his ELC and come over to North America. If he does make the Hawks, that would be really cool, but the expectation is he will go to the AHL to start, where he can be a top player with the Rockford IceHogs and maybe even go to the world juniors and be a leader on Team Germany alongside Sabres prospect John-Jason Peterka, which he didn’t get to do this season due to getting COVID. Either way it happens, I’m looking forward to Reichel’s future.
The final player in tier 2 is Adam Boqvist and I’ll spend less time on Boqvist because we know him so far. Great offensively, broke into the NHL at a very young age and put up quality point totals, plays on the power play, developing defensive game that isn’t great right now but certainly shows promise. He has good instincts but if he can put it together in his own zone, the Hawks could have a truly elite two way defenseman on their first pair for the next 10 years. The biggest problems Boqvist dealt with this year was conditioning and health. He's currently rehabbing a broken wrist and he dealt with concussion issues on top of getting COVID and missing many games because of that, it’s not exactly his fault he got concussed, broke his wrist and got COVID, but the injury issues are worth looking at for the next few years. The hawks want to play him more minutes but it doesn’t seem like Boqvist is in the proper shape to take on those extra minutes. I certainly hope that changes soon because Boqvist should absolutely be playing more than 18 minutes a night. Let's hope they can fix that soon.
TIER 3
Moving onto tier 3. In this tier I have 12 players. 7 of them have NHL time, 4 are in college and one more played in Europe this year. And between them, there are 5 forwards, 4 defensemen and 2 goalies. The first forward I wanna mention is in a bit of a pickle, because he had a great season 2 years ago, but the possibility of him capturing his potential is fleeting every day.
Dylan Strome is a former first round pick we traded for and I can’t help but think he’s overstayed his welcome. After 51 points in 58 games with the Hawks in 18-19, only 38 in 58 last season and he only had 17 in 40 games this year. The days of Dylan Strome becoming a consistent top 6 center just seem to be behind us as he has been often relegated to playing wing, which is his weaker position. He does still have his draft pedigree but I don’t know if that’s enough to carry him when his production has been very weak recently. The hawks are talking like he’s gonna be coming back next season but it seems hard to believe he’s guaranteed to be so.
Now, let's look at the 6 rookies from this season in tier 3 starting with my new favorite player, Brandon Hagel. Brandon Hagel is, put simply, my kind of hockey player. A 6th round pick by the Buffalo Sabres back in 2016, Hagel actually never signed with the Sabres, they let his rights expire and he went undrafted in the 2018 draft. He eventually had a PTO with the Habs before signing with the hawks after his 2018-19 season in Red Deer. He played all of last season in the AHL except that one game before the shutdown and this year, he's been one of the most pleasant surprises in the organization. He had 24 points in 52 games this season, and he has shown the ability to play in all scenarios. He’s been great on the penalty kill, a penalty kill that was struggling until the hawks started using him there. I hope they give him more power play time because I liked what I saw when they did. But not just on special teams, Hagel can play up and down the lineup. Line 1-4 wherever he is needed. He reminds me so much of Andrew Shaw and I would be surprised if Hagel is not a part of this team when we compete for a cup once again. The reason he’s only a tier 3 is because his individual upside isn’t very high. He will always be a complimentary piece on any line he’s playing on, doing the dirty work to let stars score and frankly, that is fine for me because I love watching him do that. Worth mentioning with Hagel, he only had 11 penalty minutes this season. 3 minors and one fighting major when he knocked out Patrik Laine and I was happy. He’s going to be playing for Team Canada at the world championships, a great accomplishment considering how competitive it is to make a team Canada roster for any hockey tournament. Buddy, make us proud.
Phillip Kurashev was a rookie forward this year who got off to a really hot start, but it sort of cooled down since then. He only had 16 points in 54 games, and most of those points were early. I think it would be far from a bad idea to get him more experience down in Rockford as their top line center to start next season. He's only 21 years old and could use the development and the opportunity to dominate. He’s very skilled and after a year in the NHL, a little seasoning to put it all together could make him a consistent top 6 contributor in the future. Not to mention the opportunity to play alongside Lukas Reichel on the IceHogs first line. It would give the team more promise than they had this season as I often called the Hogs the AHL sickos. Like Reichel and Hagel, Kurashev is another guy who you can expect in the World Championships, playing for team Switzerland, a country he carried to an elite performance at the 2019 World Juniors.
Like Kurashev, Pius Suter was a rookie from Switzerland, however he was not as young, a 24 year old playing in his first NA Pro season, Pius Suter was intriguing to Hawks fans because like Dominik Kubalik, he came to the hawks after being the leading scorer and league MVP in the Swiss National League. And like Kubalik, Suter came into the team and became an instant contributor. The night he scored his first NHL goal, he ended it with a hat trick. And he was very often playing center between Alex Debrincat and Patrick Kane. Despite some growing pains and some scoring slumps, Suter has been doing well throughout the year and looks to be an NHL contributor for the Hawks going forward after ending his rookie season with 27 points in 55 games. He decided to not play in the world championships due to his contract situation. He’s gonna be an RFA this offseason and he’s looking for a new contract from the hawks. I hope both sides can come together on a fair deal that makes sense for everyone involved.
Wyatt Kalynuk is the first defenseman in tier 3 and he came on strong late and has looked great ever since he has. A 7th round pick in 2017 by the Philadelphia Flyers, Wyatt Kalynuk decided not to sign with the Flyers after 3 seasons with Wisconsin, including the final season where he was the captain of the Badgers. Kalynuks' start in the AHL was on fire, 10 points in 8 games. He eventually got called up to the Hawks and has been on a goal scoring binge ever since he did. He’s got 4 goals in 21 games, along with that he has 5 assists for 9 points in 21 games. I expect that Kalynuk will be in our top 6 next season and the expectation is that he will be a key piece of this team's future on the back end, and a very unexpected one at that.
Nicolas Beaudin is also in tier 3 and it seems like a significant portion of this fanbase is really losing their trust in him and I’m not sure why. There are 3 reasons why I’m not ready to give up on Nic Beaudin. 1. He was only a rookie this season and was only drafted 3 years ago 2. When he played in the AHL this year he was a destroyer of worlds putting up 10 points in 9 games and 3. When he was in the NHL, he was almost exclusively playing his offhand on the right side due to the roster makeup. Beaudin rarely got the opportunity to be in a solidified top 6 without a 7th defenseman in the lineup and play on his natural left side. Kalynuk was given said opportunity and as I said he ran with it, but I hope the Hawks move out pieces on the left side of the defense to give more opportunity for Kalynuk and Beaudin to actually play their natural left side.
The final NHL player of tier 3 is a player who most of us didn’t know before this season, but by the time the season started, you were cheering him on like the rest of us, Kevin Lankinen. Lankinen is 25, which is not old by goaltender standards and he is unique. He never had great numbers in the AHL or in the Finish Liiga, but he did have one elite tournament performance in 2019, a gold medal as the starter for the Finns in the World Championship. In the gold medal game they took down the Canadians where he faced shots from Mark Stone, Anthony Mantha, Anthony Cirelli, Sam Reinhart and Jonathan Marchessault, but he stopped them and won the game 3-1 to take the gold against a team of mostly NHL players. When Malcolm Subban and Collin Delia faltered earlier in the season, Kevin Lankinen was given an opportunity and boy did he run with it. At one point in the season Lankinen had a .930 save percentage. Now, that has dropped since then to only a .909 because of an absolutely terrible end to the season, but that's still a very capable goalie in the NHL. I don’t believe that we have seen the only good that can come from Lankinen. I don’t think he’s gonna be a pure one-hit wonder and due to his location in tier 3, I see him as a guy with potential to be the hawks starting goalie for the next 5 seasons. The fact that he took a team that looked dead the first week of the season and dragged them into the playoff race was stunning and I’m looking forward to seeing more. I really hope the hawks bring in a veteran option this offseason to be a 1B option for the hawks. Lankinen played his best when he had more rest and towards the back of the season that started to change and he got worse.
Now onto the prospects for the Blackhawks in tier 3. The first one is my favorite prospect because he reminds me so much of Brandon Hagel, Landon Slaggert. I am going to say this to every Hawks fan who lives in the Midwest or has access to the Big Ten Network. If you did not take advantage to watch as many Notre Dame hockey games this season as possible, you missed out. I didn’t really start watching Slaggert until after the world juniors where he played for Team USA and was their 4th line center and key penalty kill guy on route to their gold medal finish. He also led the team in their “USA Hockey is do or die” chant after the victory which caused me to get a t-shirt because of that moment. He eventually went back to Notre Dame after the tournament and played lights out. Playing on the Irish’s first line alongside his brother, Graham and Alex Steeves, who would eventually sign a contract with the Toronto Maple Leafs after the season ended. Landon played spectacularly putting up 8 goals and 14 assists for 22 points in 25 games. Almost a PPG as a true freshman in the big ten is not an easy task, and Slaggert delivered. He played as the net front guy on the power play and was a key penalty killer for them. He also wasn’t in the box often either, only taking 5 penalties for 10 PIMs. The expectation is to go back to college next year and really develop his game alongside his brother who will be a senior. It's unknown who will be the third guy on that line, maybe one of the Janickes, or maybe even Ryder Rolston, a 2020 5th rounder of the Colorado Avalanche who the Hawks acquired in the Carl Soderberg trade.
Another Blackhawks 3rd rounder from this draft is also an American playing in college but he's a defenseman. Wyatt Kaiser played this season for Minnesota-Duluth after being a 3rd round pick of the Blackhawks in 2020, the pick we got when we traded Erik Gustafsson. Kaiser probably has the highest upside of any defenseman in the entire Hawks system besides Boqvist due to his skating talent and offensive instincts, but the rest of his game is still lagging behind the raw talent. He was a workhorse #1 defenseman for UMD last year as they went all the way to the frozen four. He was part of that 5 overtime game against North Dakota and he played almost an hour total in that game. He has big minute potential if the rest of the skills can catch up. 10 assists in 28 games last year is a good start, but I think for him to truly become a steal, I think he needs to improve his transition game, what he does with the puck in the defensive zone to move it into the neutral and offensive zone. There’s a great piece on EP Rinkside about Kaiser's freshman season and how he did and what's next. Here’s the link. I think the sky's the limit for his upside, especially given his athleticism, skating ability, and conditioning. https://eprinkside.com/2021/04/19/wyatt-kaiser-exceeded-expectations-as-a-true-freshman-for-minnesota-duluth?utm_source=eliteprospects&utm_medium=news-list&utm_campaign=player
The two final college players of tier 3 were both at Boston University this year and were also recent second rounders. The older guy is Alex Vlasic, drafted in 2019, Vlasic is 6’6” and is a left-shot defenseman known for being solid in his own zone. This year he also added a scoring touch on top of that as in 16 games, he had 3 goals 5 assists for 8 points. Pretty good on the back end for a player that isn’t known primarily for offense. This was a major step up from the previous season as he played in less than half the games this year, but doubled his scoring pace. There was a report the Hawks offered him an ELC to play with Rockford next year, but he opted to go back to college for another year. Hopefully, after another season in college with lots of improvement, especially in his d zone transition ability, he will be ready to play for the IceHogs or even Blackhawks in 2022-23.
The fourth player in college is also from BU but he’s a goalie, Drew Commesso is one of the most highly touted goalie prospects in the entire NHL. He was the second goalie selected in the 2020 NHL draft behind Yarolslav Askarov and he would’ve been with the US WJC if not for getting COVID. The expectation is that with Spencer Knight and Dustin Wolf both graduating from juniors, Drew Commesso could be the #1 goalie for Team USA next year at the world juniors. The hawks might have their goalie of the future if Commesso’s development keeps on going well. He had a .915 SV% last year and that includes a nightmare game in the playoffs where everything went wrong after a disappearing puck ended up in the back of the net against him and nobody on BU knew where it was allowing St Cloud State to score. Before that game he was at a .920. I think he’s gonna be really good, we just need to see him keep it going.
The final player in tier 3 is a goalie the Hawks just signed out of Europe only a few days ago, Arvid Soderblom. Soderblom looks like the perfect example of a late bloomer goalie prospect, like a lot of goalies just so happen to be. Soderblom is 21 years old and will be 22 at the start of training camp next season. He was not on anybody’s radar only 3 seasons ago because in the 2018-19 season, he was a goalie in the third tier of Swedish Hockey, HockeyEttan with a 3.16 GAA and a .908 SV%, not bad for a 19 year old in his first professional season. The next year he moved up to the Allsvenskan and in 32 games he put up a 2.38 GAA and a .924 SV%. Those numbers are incredible, even for a 20 year old in tier 2 Swedish hockey, and those great numbers were enough to earn him a contract this year with Skelleftea in the top Swedish League, the Swedish Hockey League. Despite being an SHL rookie and only 21 years old. Soderblom put up a 13-8 record with a 2.03 GAA and a .922 SV%. In the last 3 years despite moving up and up to the next best tier of Swedish hockey, Arvid Soderblom actually improved at every level significantly from the previous. And he did this all over the course of only 3 years from ages 19-21. He has now signed a contract with the Blackhawks and the expectation is he will be coming over to play with the IceHogs next year. You never want to rush goalies and with the issues Lankinen had once he got tired, you don’t want to make a 22 year old goalie the 1B you use to give Lank rest. He’s a young but clearly talented goalie who has a nice track record in Swedish hockey including the SHL and it looks like the Hawks might have a goalie of the future without even spending a draft pick on it. Nice work to the entire European Scouting department for the Hawks who just happen to always crush it with their signings over there. Let's hope this is just another victory on that front.
TIER 4
Moving on to tier 4. There are 12 players in this tier. 7 of them have NHL experience but only 5 of them qualify as graduates. There are 9 forwards and 3 defenseman in this tier.
Alex Nylander is probably the most notorious name in this tier. He missed the entire season this year with a knee injury and despite being a former top 10 pick, I don’t know how good he can really become. He struggled throughout the season last year despite getting top 6 minutes at times to the point where he was eventually bumped out of the Hawks lineup during the bubble. 26 points in 65 games at 22 years old should be a player of the future for you, but after goose eggs in the 8 bubble games, I can’t help but think his time in Chicago is coming to an end soon. I think that due to the injury, they will give him the chance to prove himself on this team next season, but he’s gonna have to show a lot coming off an injury to make him more valuable than some of the pieces already on this team.
While Nylander may be seen as a disappointment so far, he isn’t even the only 2016 first round pick in this tier of the pyramid, because the next player is Henrik Borgstrom. Borgstrom was drafted 23rd overall by the Florida Panthers and he was traded to us this year at the deadline in the Brett Connolly/Lucas Wallmark trade. Borgstrom is interesting for 2 reasons. 1. Despite being from Finland, he played college hockey with Ian Mitchell at Denver and freaking dominated, and 2. He played this year back in Finland due to unlikely and unstable ice time if he came over to the NHL/AHL this year. Fortunately enough for him, Stan Bowman absolutely believes in him. He put up good numbers in Finland this year, 21 points in 30 games for IFK Helsinki. A few weeks ago he signed a 2 year deal with the Hawks to come back to the NHL at only 1M AAV. He only has 19 points in 58 NHL games throughout his career, but the Hawks are likely to give him the chance to prove he can be an NHL player, maybe even a center. The hawks have a hodgepodge of players who can play center at possibly top 6 caliber and Borgstrom is another one of those guys.
Borgstrom was a dominant player in college and the Hawks are hoping they can rekindle the magic he had from his 2018 Hobey Baker Trophy Finalist season. While he might have lost the award, the Hawks actually do have the 2018 Hobey Baker Award Winner. Adam Gaudette was recently acquired in a trade from the Vancouver Canucks after a very disappointing follow-up to a great season. Gaudette is mostly a center and that's where he was at his best, but when he came to the Hawks, he played up in the lineup but on the wing. After only 7 points in 33 games with Vancouver, he put up 4 in 7 to end the season with the Hawks despite struggling to find a spot in the lineup every night. His future with the hawks is extremely unsure. He’s gonna turn 25 at the start of next season, and it's possible he’s the odd man out when it comes to the Hawks plans for the expansion draft. Like a bunch of guys mentioned before, he's also in that cluster of mid-level NHL players on the roster who are best at center, but we likely don’t have space for them to play center. We will have to see but I'm not exactly expecting much as a lot of his production in his best season was on the power play and I don’t see much PP time for Gaudette in our lineup. Even in his best season his defensive metrics were still awful as he was a -7 on a playoff team with a CF% of only 46. Honestly as I look into him more the less I want him so I’m just gonna stop.
As for the NHL defenseman, Ian Mitchell played in each of the first 30 NHL games for the Hawks this season, oftentimes on a defensive pair Duncan Keith, a player he idolized as a fellow second round pick, Junior A player from Western Canada. Mitchell played 3 seasons at the University of Denver, the third of which he was the captain. Mitchell frankly struggled this season, especially defensively, but his puck moving and stretch pass ability is very impressive. Mitchell is a guy who I expect to get plenty of opportunity to show he belongs on an NHL defense. He’s been fine so far, but he’s gonna need to take a step to be trusted inside the Hawks top 4 blueliners.
Alongside Mitchell, Riley Stillman is a player I can see factoring into the Hawks third pair next season. Stillman is a young physical defensive defenseman who the hawks also acquired from Florida alongside Borgstrom and Stillman has plenty of NHL experience. He’s not super big as he's only 6’1” but he really likes to lay hits as he had 37 of them in only 13 games for the Hawks. Now, Stillman is this low because basically a non-factor on offense, he only has one NHL goal, his only point with the Hawks so far and it was a deflection off his leg, but his physicality and skill are tools that should be valuable moving forward in a PK/3rd pair stay-at-home role. I think he’s a very valuable depth piece moving forward and the hawks agreed, as they signed him to a 3 year contract extension with 1.35 AAV only a few weeks after trading for him. Considering the money they’d need to pay Nikita Zadorov to essentially do the same job, I think they’re much better off using that money somewhere else and trading/letting Zadorov walk.
Now we move on to the players who either have very minimal or no NHL experience. Mackenzie Entwistle is a big forward who can play winger or center. He was originally a 3rd round pick back in 2017 by the Arizona Coyotes, but he was traded to the Hawks in the deal where we traded away Jordan Oesterle, Vinnie Hinostroza and Marian Hossa’s contract. Entwistle played mostly in the AHL this season after doing the same last year too. In his time in Rockford, he had 12 points in 22 games, and that production was enough to earn a callup to end out the year. In 5 games with the Hawks this season, Entwistle was actually pretty good, he ended up with a goal and an assist. Each of which involves a connection with fellow rookie Mike Hardman. Entwistle is hoping to make the team this year, but my expectation is he goes back to the Hogs to start next season. The AHL team should be much better next year and hopefully Mack can step up his production with the improved roster, or his ice time might get cut if he can’t make that step. I’m a fan of Ent’s game so I hope he makes an impact soon.
There is one more player in tier 4 with NHL games played, but its very small as he’s only played 3, Alec Regula played in the final 3 games for the Hawks this season. He’s another former third round pick we acquired in a trade, this one was with the Detroit Red Wings in exchange for Brendan Perlini. Regula is a 6’4'' right handed defenseman who got his callup at a very weird time. He wasn’t overly impressive in his AHL play, but he still got the NHL call-up despite that and was VERY good. I was really impressed with his skills especially his transition play and I think it's extremely possible he gets a real shot to fight for an NHL spot out of training camp.
Evan Barratt, like Entwistle and Regula beforehand, was also a third round pick, however he was actually drafted by the Hawks unlike them. Barratt is a center and played all of last season in the AHL where he put up 14 points in 27 games as an AHL rookie. He was called up really late in the season but for some reason he never actually got in a game. I was surprised by that but I think he’s a very compelling depth player for the future as he's only 22.
The 4th straight former 3rd round pick is Andrei Altybarmakyan, yes, the name is indeed a mouthful, but he's also a pretty good player. He played for a few years post draft in the KHL and then last year he made the move toward the AHL where he had 12 points in 29 games. Again, the IceHogs were really bad this year so the lack of points on these players shouldn’t be too alarming; they were the leading scorers on the team. Alty is very feisty on the ice and I’m looking forward to seeing more of him at the AHL level, hopefully he keeps working on his traits that can turn him into a complimentary scorer in a top 9 role.
Michal Teply also made his AHL debut this season, but unlike the previous players, it wasn’t how we expected it to go. Teply was a 4th round pick in 2019 from the Czech Republic who had a ton of upside, especially with his shot. The hype for him went off the rails last year after an insane rookie season in the WHL with the newly relocated Winnipeg ICE, putting up 63 points in 53 games, including 5 assists in 5 games in the World Juniors and because of those two impressive feats I almost put him in tier 3 last year, but after a disappointing season in the AHL with only 5 assists in 18 games and no goals. Not to mention only 2 assists and no goals at the 2021 world Juniors, I need to see much more from him before I can move him back up to tier 3 and he’s genuinely in danger of dropping to tier 5 with another rough season.
Another European 4th rounder from 2019 is Antti Saarela, who played this entire season with Ilves in the Finnish Liiga. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t expect more from Antti Saarela. He is playing a prominent role on his team, but he’s only got 14 points in 47 games, which is not great considering the pace he was on during the previous 2 Liiga seasons AND after only having 12 PIMs in 40 games the year before, Saarela had 51 PIMs in 47 games this season. In order for him to be considered a legit prospect with NHL potential, I’m gonna need to see more scoring and far fewer penalty minutes from him. I like his defensive ability that I remember seeing at the world juniors a few years ago, but I need to see better discipline and hopefully more offense too.
The final player in tier 4 is another European, but this guy is playing in the KHL and that's Artur Kayumov. Kayumov was a second round pick back in 2016 and he seems like a pick where the Hawks said, “Artemi Panarin just worked, lets draft a kid with a similar pedigree” and so far, it hasn’t translated into being an elite player in the KHL like Panarin was as Kayumov is mostly just a middle six player for Lokomotiv Yaroslavl. He’s 23 years old and put up 29 points in 57 games this season. His contract expires after next year so maybe he takes a bigger role on his team and has a breakout season, if that happens, he might end up signing with the Hawks, if not, he might stay in Russia for the rest of his career.
TIER 5
We now move onto tier 5 and these players are all very unlikely to be anything more than depth players in the NHL, so I’ll likely only say a few sentences about each, but there are 12 players in this tier. There are 6 forwards and 6 defenseman in this tier.
Matej Chalupa was a Undrafted signing out of the Czech league during the 2020 pause. He came in with some high expectations going to the AHL as he had 24 points in 50 games in the Czech league at only age 21. Unfortunately he did not meet the expectations some had for him in the AHL this year as he had only 7 points in 27 games with Rockford this year. The team had less confidence in him as the year went on and the team got better as he went farther down the lineup. Not a good look but he’s only gonna be 23 next season so maybe he takes the next step.
Mike Hardman was another Undrafted player but the Hawks signed him out of college. He spent the last 2 seasons with Boston College in the NCAA where he played on a top line with Alex Newhook and Matt Boldy. Hardman excelled as a complimentary player putting up 19 points in 25 games this season. He signed with the Hawks after his college season ended and after a few weeks on the Taxi Squad, he made his NHL debut and played in 8 games for the Hawks this year. While he had only 3 points in those games, he did get his first NHL goal off a feed from Mackenzie Entwistle, and he absolutely laid the body every night as he was credited with 38 hits in those games. His upside doesn’t seem to be too high, but if he can be a quality 4th liner for years, that seems to be something worth keeping around.
Cam Morrison was a college free agency signing by the Hawks, but he was not undrafted, he was just never signed by the team that drafted him. Morrison was selected with the 40th pick in the 2016 Draft by the Colorado Avalanche. Now what's really funny about this is he was the pick right after the Hawks took Alex Debrincat. What would you rather have? A top 5 goal scorer in the NHL or a guy you never sign. Now the Hawks have both. Morrison was supposed to play his first pro season with the IceHogs this year, but he ended up getting hurt and missing all season. Expectation is he can bounce back and have a full season next year. He was a second rounder only 5 years ago and we know what happened to Justin Holl after the Hawks gave up on him, maybe it’s worth the gamble for us to take on his draft pedigree.
Niklas Nordgren was a 3rd rounder back in 2018 and he’s simply struggled to find a consistent path in the Liiga. He’s always been able to crush U-20 competition but it’s been more difficult at the top level as he never got consistent opportunities with HIFK. Next year, he’s going to be playing for the Lahden Pelicans and hopefully he has a consistent role and is able to show off his potential at the top men’s league in Finland. He had 3 points in 3 games this year, hopefully he can do something great over a full season.
Ryder Rolston was a 2020 5th rounder by the Avalanche and we acquired him in the deal for Carl Soderberg. He’s played this past season at Notre Dame where he had 6 points in 28 games. Of course, Rolston is playing with Landon Slaggert and Rolston is known for having great speed but a lack of consistency, maybe he can add more production as a sophomore playing alongside another hawks prospect. We will see.
Jake Wise was another 2018 3rd rounder by the hawks and his situation is different from others, Wise was seen as a great talent coming into the draft but he just could not stay healthy. That has unfortunately continued into his college career at Boston University. He only was able to play in 5 games this year due to injuries. After this season he decided to transfer to Ohio State where hopefully he can show himself to be a top player on that team. I watched a lot of OSU last year playing against ND for my Slaggert study and boy, they really aren’t good as Layton Ahac was like their only good player, and he's now gone pro to the AHL. Hopefully Jake Wise can show he’s far more capable than he showed at BU.
Moving onto the defenseman, we start with a guy who was only a 7th rounder in 2020, but I find him extremely intriguing for several reasons, Louis Crevier. Crevier has one very distinct trait, he’s huge, like seriously he’s a monster. He’s 6’8” 203 lbs. right shot defenseman. That’s insane. His game is still clearly a work in progress, but it looks like it’s progressing well. He’s got a strong defensive game being able to use his size well and his offense isn’t half bad either as he put up 14 points in 26 games this QMJHL season for Chicoutimi. He’s got a lot of Boom/Bust in him and of course it’s not a big deal when a 7th rounder doesn’t work, but he looks like a fascinating case study to see what he can do with those physical traits over the next couple of years.
Slava Demin is a college defenseman who’s played at Denver for the last few years. 4th round pick by the Vegas Golden Knights in 2018, he was part of the package the Hawks got for Robin Lehner. This season he had 8 points in 21 games for U Denver which was towards the lead among defenseman. Something that is intriguing is he led his team in +/-, that’s good! He also was towards the top in PIMs, that’s not as good. Next year, he’s gonna be playing for Umass as he transferred from Denver. I can’t say joining the defending champs is ever a bad idea.
Jakub Galvas is a Czech defenseman who the hawks just signed to an ELC after drafting him in the 5th round in 2017. He was supposed to be at the Worlds but he broke his arm. He played for Jukurit in the Liiga the past 2 years and had 11 points in 43 games last year. Unfortunately, Jukurit was one of the worst teams in the Liiga last year, and Galvas didn’t seem to be able to transcend that as he had a -19 rating which was below average on the team. My friend Wally seems to be a big fan of his, but I haven’t seen a ton yet. He should be in Rockford next year so we may see then if he’s got NHL potential.
Michal Krutil is also a Czech defenseman, but unlike Galvas he’s a right shot dman. He was drafted in the 4th round in 2020 and he came over to play in the AHL this year and REALLY struggled to start. He didn’t look like he was ready for NA pro hockey, things got better as the year went on though and his overall game improved. My hope is the hawks send him to the Kelowna Rockets in the WHL next season as I think a year playing against his peers could do him really well in developing a well rounded 2 way game with strong defensive instincts.
Chad Krys was a second rounder in 2016 and that’s kind of the only reason he’s not in tier 6 but in tier 5. He played only 6 games in the AHL this year until he got hurt and missed the rest of the season. Maybe there's something still there. But he hasn’t been great so far and he’s getting up there in age. I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt since he got hurt, but it didn’t look great beforehand.
And the final player in Tier 5 is Isaak Phillips. Phillips was a 5th rounder in 2020 and he played junior hockey for the Sudbury Wolves. He always played with Quinton Byfield and it never seemed like he truly stood out, but the hawks saw something in him and after this AHL season, it looks like a pick that might end up working out. Phillips was a mainstay on the Hogs blueline all year doing a great job on both ends of the ice and winning the teams rookie of the year award. 9 points in 27 games for the Hogs this year is very impressive for a 19 year old in the AHL and it was enough to go from an AHL amateur tryout contract to signing an NHL ELC. Looking forward to seeing how his development goes from this point on
TIER 6The final tier is tier 6. Most people just call this the everybody else tier but I want to at least give a small recognition to each player involved. There are 12 guys in tier 6 and I’m gonna limit myself to 2 sentences max for each guy.
Josh Dickinson-ECHL player acquired in the Soderberg trade and only had 8 points in 17 ECHL games. He’s an RFA this offseason and I wouldn’t be shocked if the hawks don’t qualify him.
Parker Foo- was a college forward who didn’t do a lot of scoring in a very low level of competition. He’s now in the KHL where he plays on a bad team putting up very low point totals.
Mikael Hakkarainen- 2018 5th rounder, a Finn from the USHL. Split time between the AHL and ECHL this year for 12 games and only had one assist in the ECHL.
Reese Johnson- Actually played NHL games this year where he got in a fight but had no points in 5 games. He’s an energy guy and a former Junior teammate of Brandon Hagel, but only had 8 points in 18 AHL games and 40 PIMs in that timeframe.
Josiah Slavin-2018 7th round pick is the younger brother of Canes star defenseman Jaccob Slavin. Got off to a hot start after joining the Hogs at the conclusion of his college season, but cooled off towards the end and ended up right back here.
Tim Soderlund-Most frustrating player on the IceHogs. One of the fastest and most skilled players (always takes and scores in shootouts) but cannot seem to consistently score or score at all during actual hockey.
Chad Yetman-was a 6th round pick in 2020 from the Erie Otters and struggled to start in the AHL. After returning from the ECHL, where he wasn’t even that good, he ended the season strong, finishing with 7 points in 16 AHL games.
Josh Ess-2017 7th round pick who played the last 4 years at Wisconsin on their blue line. It’s unlikely he will sign an NHL contract with the Hawks AKA not gonna be a Hawks prospect for much longer.
Roope Lavainen- 2017 4th round pick who plays in Liiga in Finland. His rights expire this summer and he’s committed to staying in Finland AKA not gonna be Hawks prospect for much longer.
Jake Ryzcek- 2016 7th round pick who played in the ECHL in 2019-20 and then didn’t play any hockey in 2020-21. I don’t even know why his rights are still owned by the Hawks.
Dominic Basse- 2019 6th round pick as a goalie who dominated midget hockey. He’s since been the primary goalie as a true freshman for an awful Colorado College team and has been unable to give them any relevance as they toil in the basement of their conference.
And that is every player on the Hawks radar 25 and under and our 2021 Blackhawks Youth Pyramid. If you actually got to the end of this post, thank you so much for reading. I might do a video where I talk about this, but probably after the draft and free agency when the Hawks prospect pool is more clear going into the next season.


Sources: (I don't really need to do this just use these sights dammit they're so valuable)
Eliteprospects.com
Evolving-hockey.com
https://twitter.com/Chi_Prospects (seriously follow Wally, he does a great job following up on all the Hawks prospects)
https://scouching.ca