CHL

• Carson Focht continues to lead the Hitmen in offence. He will be playing in the Canada/Russia Subway series later this month with Jett Woo and will be up against Vasili Podkolzin. He’s currently playing at the time of writing this and scored a goal in tight.

• Ethan Keppen scored 1 goal in 3 games this week. The Firebirds are 10-5-0 to start the season, a welcome change from seasons past.

• Arturs Silovs stood on his head against those same Firebirds in a 5-1 Barrie Colts victory where he stopped 37 of 38 shots. His .913 save% is 5th in the OHL and 2nd for u-19 goaltenders. With the success of Thatcher Demko at the NHL level and Micheal DiPietro at the AHL level, it is exciting to have another goalie seeing early success at another level of development.

NCAA

• Will Lockwood scored with the same move again this week! On top of the left circle and attacking towards the middle, he rotates his torso at the last second and fires a deceptive shot past the goalie. All three of his goals this season have been scored in this fashion. While he hasn’t been lighting up the score sheet, he’s looked good using his speed on the forecheck and disrupting defences, similar to the type of game he projects to play as a pro.

• Tyler Madden had 2 assists in 3 games this week and assisted on fellow Canucks prospect Aidan McDonogh’s first NCAA goal.

• McDonough has 1 goal and 0 assists through 5 games playing on Madden’s wing with 13 shots.
• Jack Rathbone had an electrifying season debut with Harvard scoring 2 goals in a 7-3 victory. He’s had a fascinating journey after being drafted and his currently in his sophomore season with the Crimson after delaying his first College season by a year. It will be interesting to watch him this year as his partner, Adam Fox – one of the top NCAA defencemen last year, is now a pro. Rathbone will be heavily relied upon this year by the Crimson. My friend DanielGScouting noted that while he scored 2 goals, he was also on the ice for 2 goals against.

• Matthew Thiessen has not had a start since his shaky first performance.

Russia

• Vasili Podkolzin will suit up for Russia as they take on the CHL’s best in the Canada/Russia Subway series this month.

Sweden

• Nils Hoglander scored a goal, you may have seen it. He has been playing in Rogle’s bottom-six since his return from suspension alongside another skilled young player in Dominik Bokk.

• Arvid Costmar had a goal in 1 game of SuperElit action. He is bouncing between Linkoping’s SHL and SuperElit teams at the moment and at this stage in development, he just needs to play. I wonder what it would take for a loan to the Allsvenskan.

Czech

• Karel Plasek had an assist in 2 games of work this week. Count him as a player that I need to get more viewings of as the Czech league is an unknown to me.

Finland

• Petrus Palmu continues his torrid scoring pace with another 5 points in 2 games.

AHL

• All good things must come to an end, including Utica’s 8-game win streak to open the season. To make matters worse, they were shutout in both games this week so not many highlights to cover.
• Michael DiPietro was a bright spot stopping 23 of 25 and came in for to relieve Zane McIntyre the next night where he stopped 14 of 16. His .927 save% ranks him 16th among AHL goaltenders and 5th among rookies.
• I wasn’t able to follow the Comets as closely as I would have liked to this week so I can’t offer much more analysis than this. It was a busy week for not only the prospects! If you would like to read more about what happened to the Comets, Cory Hergott’s Comets Post-Games are a great place to start.