IIHF U18 Recap

The under 18’s concluded this past Sunday with the USA taking home the gold defeating the Czech Republic 5-2. Canada took home the bronze defeating Sweden 3-1. I was not able to watch as many games as I had hoped but thanks to Fast Hockey was able to catch a few of the USA games. What follows is a stock watch, who improved their draft stock and who hurt it from this tournament.

Rising

William Nylander

The players who stock rose the most for me from this short tournament was William Nylander. Nylander started the year as a potential number one overall pick, but after not making the Swedish World Junior roster his stock dropped to outside the top 10. Rightfully or not he needed a big tournament to prove his worth to scouts. He did not disappoint leading the tournament in scoring with 6 goals and 10 assists in 7 games. He has definitely cemented himself into my top 10 with top 5 a possibility.      

Sonny Milano

As mentioned I saw a quite a few of Team USA’s games which means I had plenty of chances to see Sonny Milano. He played on the US’s top line with Jack Eichel and did not look out of place at all. He finished the tournament tied with Eichel (and Jakub Vrana) for third in scoring with 10 points. Milano has some of the top puck possession skills in the draft and he showed it in the games I watched. I like him as a top 15 pick.

Kevin Fiala

The Swiss forward has been climbing up everyone’s draft rankings it seems like. Personally I did not know much about this player going into the tournament. However he made his impact felt immediately. He was a key factor in the Swiss upsetting the USA in the first game of the tournament. He had a goal and an assist in that game, and finished with 9 points in just 5 games. From Corey Pronmann on twitter it appears that Fiala that a shot to make the Swiss national team for the World Championships. If he were to make that team, that will boost his stock even higher. He is now a sure-fire first rounder likely in the 15-20 range for me but could go even higher if he is able to make the World Championship roster.

Falling

Kasperi Kapanen

Kapanen came into the tournament as the top ranked European by central scouting’s final rankings. I expected him to do very well this tournament as it was in his home country of Finland. It wasn’t just Kapanen who struggled but the whole Finnish team as they did not even challenge for a medal. Kapanen has to take some of the blame as he is the star of that team. He had a poor tournament not even cracking the top 30 in scoring. He won’t drop too far in rankings as he’s had a great season, but this drops him a few spots down in my books.   

Upcoming

The OHL finals are set to start on Thursday with North Bay taking on Guelph. The winner will join London in the Memorial Cup. Personally I like Guelph in this series but North Bay after struggling to get through Niagara, rolled through Barrie and decimated Oshawa. Will be a good series regardless of who wins. I will be purchasing the OHL Livestream feature so that I can watch this series. Look for scoring chance data and reports on the draft eligible guys after each game. 

Also in the next few weeks I will post my draft rankings for the top 30 or so players. This won’t be a mock draft but rather my personal rankings. I also will include some sleepers who are guys I like in the later rounds of the draft.