Welcome back to The Journey, where we track the development of prospects as they excel in junior, make the NHL, and push towards stardom.

Last week, we dug into a few interesting outliers from Mitch Brown's tracking data on prospects from the CHL and/or USHL—players who performed among the best in various categories but do not have nearly the same hype as some of their peers. This week, we will continue that project with European prospects by turning our attention to data tracked by Brown's EP Rinkside colleague and Patreon partner, Lassi Alanen. Here is their Patreon, which I would highly recommend, in case you are interested in digging into the data for yourself.

One thing to note about Alanen's work is that it includes data from 2017 to 2023 on select prospects playing in Czechia, J20 Nationell, KHL, Liiga, MHL, NL, SHL, Slovakia, U20 SM-sarja, and VHL. That is why it includes the year (ie. DY = Draft Year, Draft+1 = Year after being drafted). Brown's data, by contrast, was all from the 2022-23 campaign. Manually tracking games from this many players is a massive undertaking, and there are plenty of "holes," so to speak, players from this or that league who do not appear in the dataset. That means that even if a prospect is in the top five, for instance, according to this data, that does not necessarily mean they are in the top five all-time or even during that seven-year span. Still, there are enough high-level players tracked to make some very interesting observations.

I did not spend time highlighting Connor Bedard (CHI) or Zach Benson (BUF) last week, despite the fact that they both stood out in a major way; likewise, I will not focus this week on major, high-profile prospects in Europe either. As a general observation, though, Ivan Demidov (2024), Matvei Michkov (PHI), and Leo Carlsson (ANA) look unreal across the board. Significant impact players who stand head and shoulders above their peers by almost every measure. 

Now let's turn to some lower-profile players from Europe who warrant further attention.

Ville Koivunen, DY (CAR)

4th in Expected Primary Points

3rd in Advantages Created

5th in Shot Contributions

3rd in Offensive Involvement

1st in Passer Rating

2nd in Inside Play

2nd in Game Score

How's this for an Analytics Darling? Dark blue across the board.

Beyond the Big Three mentioned above, Koivunen's DY performance from 2021 stands out again and again and again—top five in multiple categories. In most cases, the only players ahead of him were Demidov, Michkov, and Carlsson, and in several cases Koivunen actually bested one or more of them. His was a name I was familiar with, but I was not expecting this level of excellence from his draft year performance given that he was taken in the second round that year by Carolina.

There were a variety of opinions on Koivunen from industry sources in his draft year: he received ranks of 31st and 34th from McKeen's and Elite Prospects, respectively, but Dobber Prospects and several other major outlets had him in the 60s—a late-second, early-third round pick. The pros included his smart, slick playmaking and high-end hockey sense; the cons focused on his average skating ability, lack of physical presence, and sometimes disinterested play in the defensive zone.

As the brilliant Will Scouch points out in this detailed deep dive on Koivunen ahead of the 2021 draft, Koivunen is an incredibly smart and efficient hockey player who almost never loses the puck. Plays do not die on his stick, in other words, and opponents will very rarely be able to strip the puck off him cleanly and go back the other way for a break because he will be hounding them the whole way.

How has he performed since his incredible DY campaign in the Finnish junior league? He stepped up to the Liiga in his D+1 and scored an impressive, assist-heavy 29 points in 53 games. Then, this past year, he posted a mirror version of 2021-22 with 28 points in 52 games. Aside from the lack of scoring progression, which is a very minor red flag, these look like excellent numbers from a 19- and 20-year-old player in a top professional men's league. 

At the same time, models that consider historical production give Koivunen only a three percent (JFresh) and two percent (Hockey Prospecting) chance of becoming a star at the NHL level. So even though his underlying metrics in his draft year were off the charts, his scoring to this point has not been at the level we usually expect from players who go on to become NHL stars. Hopefully he takes a step forward in 2023-24 when he returns for a third shot at the Liiga with Kärpät, where he was the fifth-leading scorer last year.

Roman Kantserov, DY (CHI)

11th in Expected Primary Points

2nd in Shot Contributions

4th in Offensive Involvement

7th in Inside Play

6th in Game Score

First things first: Kantserov has size (5-9, 176 lbs) and nationality (Russian) working against his NHL likelihood. Physicality is currently his biggest challenge, in terms of skill-set, and playing in Russia means that there is always a chance he never comes over to North America. Even if he does join the Blackhawks a couple years from now, it might be difficult to scrutinize his progression over the upcoming seasons because he will likely bounce between the MHL, VHL, and KHL and receive minimal ice time and opportunity at the highest levels—like Danila Yurov (MIN) this past year, for instance.

With those caveats out of the way, Kantserov is a shifty, dynamic playmaker who also loves to shoot—despite "only" wielding an NHL average shot. He impressively finished 2nd in Shot Contributions in Alanen's data set, for instance, ahead of Michkov, Carlsson, Koivunen, Tim Stutzle, Anton Lundell, Vasily Podkolzin, and others. He consistently drives play to the middle and is central to his team's offense. He also showed encouraging progression over the course of his DY campaign to the point that he looked like "a high-level playmaker who could orchestrate both rush and offensive zone scoring chances with a combination of clever skating patterns and puck movements" (EP Draft Guide).

Kantserov is one of my favourite dynasty stashes right now. If you have the farm space and patience to sit on him for a few years, it is easy to imagine him growing a couple inches, honing his game further, and crossing over to play with Connor Bedard & Co.—who will have some of the growing pains out of the way by then—as a dynamic 21-year-old scoring winger. Hawks GM Kyle Davidson said after the draft that he sees Kantserov as a top-six talent.

Check out his deceptiveness in tight on this slick MHL goal:

THE HANDS 👐
🚨 #Blackhawks Roman Kantserov
2-1 Metallurg #BashkortostanCup pic.twitter.com/znmPcC32dQ

— Hockey News Hub (@HockeyNewsHub) August 11, 2023

Felix Nilsson, DY (NAS)

9th in Expected Primary Points

1st in Advantages Created for Self/60

5th in Advantages Created

5th in Offensive Involvement

2nd in Passer Rating

9th in Inside Play

10th in Game Score

"Balanced" is the word to describe Nilsson.

His skill-set has no holes and rates highly across the board, highlighted by excellent passing and hockey sense. Even though he went scoreless in 18 SHL games at the end of the year, the data shows that he excelled against his peers in the J20, where he scored 41 points in 36 games. It is not just the points, however, but how he scored them. It is a testament to his high-end playmaking that he finished second only to Koivunen in Passer Rating, which by way of a reminder is a "measure of a player’s offensive zone playmaking, weighted by value of their passes, difficulty, and result."

Most intriguing, though, was the fact that he finished first in the entire data set in Advantages Created for Self/60, which described "which players successfully beat at least one defender to create an advantage, and how." In other words, he is deceptive, elusive, and creative with the puck, consistently maintaining possession and battling through pressure. The fact that he finished just outside the top ten in Advantages Created for Teammates/60 (and fifth overall in total Advantages Created) shows that he also understands how to utilize his teammates with give-and-gos and board cycles—he does not just try to do everything himself. 

While Carlsson, Demidov, and Michkov created more Advantages/60 overall, Nilsson did so more often in the defensive zone than almost any other top forward, finishing behind only Noah Ostlund (BUF) and Aleksi Heimosalmi (CAR) in that regard. That speaks to his strong two-way ability and explains why most scouting outlets saw him ahead of the draft as having more of a middle-six ceiling than other top prospects. He is committed to playing responsibly in his own zone but also has the tools to contribute on offense.

Felix Nilsson (NSH, #43) was the best draft-eligible forward in the J20 Nationell this season. Really smart, really skilled, a crafty playmaker, inside-driven, a strong competitor. Skating and rush patterns improved through the season. Absolutely love this pick. pic.twitter.com/V4IQBfsliR

— Lassi Alanen (@lassialanen) June 29, 2023

Honourable Mentions

Samu Salminen, DY

5th in Expected Primary Points

11th in Game Score

2nd behind Carlsson in scoring off the rush

Nico Huuhtanen, DY

11th in Shot Contributions

Radel Zamaltdinov

4th in Game Score (one ahead of Michkov)

Thanks for reading! Follow me on Twitter @beegare for more prospect content and fantasy hockey analysis.