Welcome back to The Journey, where we track the development of prospects as they excel in junior, make the NHL, and push towards stardom. This week we will profile a number of top NHL prospects who are dominating professional men's leagues in Europe.

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SHL

In the SHL, Jonathan Lekkerimaki (VAN) has slowed quite a lot since his fiery start. But scanning the leaderboard, I did not fully grasp over the past couple months how unusual it was for someone of his age to be scoring prolifically in that league. The Canucks prospect currently sits 38th in league scoring as a 19-year-old with 12 points in 18 games. The youngest players other than him in the top 50 are a couple of 24-year-olds. Everyone else is at least five years older.

The only other teenager in the top 75 SHL scorers (52nd) is Detroit's Axel Sandin-Pelikka (11 in 19), who has been steadily producing eye-popping highlights as an 18-year-old defender in his Draft+1.

Axel Sandin Pellikka (#LGRW) had the first three-point game of his SHL career on Nov 16th.

It was also a transition masterclass, showcasing why he's quickly becoming one of the best defensive prospects in the sport.

Highlights: pic.twitter.com/jdOI84wFsn

— Lassi Alanen (@lassialanen) November 18, 2023

Hockey Prospecting has not yet updated for the current campaign, but we can expect that draft year star potential to spike well into double digits given his excellence in a premier men's league. Sometimes draft-eligibles coming out of European leagues do not profile as well in these models as players in North American junior leagues or college.

ASP stocks are headed straight through the roof as the Red Wings continue to stockpile a dragon's hoard on the back end.

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Allsvenskan

The only prospect that sticks out from Sweden's second-tier league is Detroit's Liam Dower Nilsson (DET), who currently has 15 points in 21 games—the same total as he posted last year but in 11 fewer games.

That statistical progression is encouraging to see for the former fifth-rounder from 2021, but I wonder if it is good enough to assure his NHL trajectory. There are not many other 20-year-olds up scoring at this rate in the Allsvenskan, and it is not a junior-level league, but he still has a long way to go—particularly with his skating—to prove he can be an asset in the world's top league.

On the plus side, he is probably sitting on the waiver wire even in deeper keeper and dynasties. There are worse prospects to stash, especially if you are rebuilding.

Liam Dower Nilsson's 8th goal in 9 GP this season.

Last year in Allsvenskan he had 3 goals in 32 GP. #LGRW pic.twitter.com/r3GPQwoJix

— IcehockeyGifs (@IcehockeyG) October 18, 2023

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Liiga

Next let's head over to Finland's top league, where three prospects have separated themselves from the pack.

Jani Nyman, Seattle's second-round pick in 2022, currently leads the league in goals with 13 in 22 games (plus five assists). That total already tops his personal best of 10 goals in 29 games from last year, which outpaced fellow Finn Joakim Kemell (NAS) amongst U19 skaters. I have been completely sleeping on Nyman, to be honest; he was billed as a big guy with soft hands, a dangerous shot, and heavy feet in his draft year and did not really seem worthy of much fantasy attention at the time.

But a 6-3, 215 lbs prospect leading a European professional league is goals at age 19? That is very, very impressive. Once again, a player with great tools across the board aside from his skating who is figuring that part out through steady pro-level development. Speed is a serious, critical asset but also one of the easiest tools in a skillset to hone through targeted training.

Here he is scoring his 13th goal a couple days ago, swooping in through traffic to bury a rebound.

🚨Rystyllä sisään! Jani Nyman taiteilee kauden 12. maalin! 🔥

📺: @MTVUrheilu| #Liiga #Ilves pic.twitter.com/U8W783MLGV

— Liiga (@smliiga) November 23, 2023

Niko Huuhtanen (TBL), 20, is another big guy with a powerful shot who has been dominating the Finnish league in the early going. As a former seventh-round pick, he has a much higher hill to climb than many of his pedigreed peers. But this is his second year in a row showing well in the Liiga after scoring 30 in 48 last year.

20-year-old Niko Huuhtanen, a former seventh-round pick by #gobolts has 15 points in 19 Liiga games this year.

Hits, shots, points ✅✅✅ https://t.co/wsY7fwCpsI

— Ben Gehrels (@beegare) November 18, 2023

A promising sign that he will cross the pond sooner rather than later is that he already has one WHL campaign under his belt (his D+1). He did very well in the North American context, especially in the playoffs, where he popped off for 10 points in only five games.

While we can likely expect an AHL audition before we see him up with the Bolts, anything can happen with a high-octane offense like that. Huuhtanen's star could rise in a hurry. He offers additional intrigue in multi-cat formats because he plays a physical game and loves to shoot.

Ville Koivunen (CAR), 20, is the third prospect I want to highlight today from the Liiga. He passed Huuhtanen today with a big three-point game, including this gem:

🚨 Ville Koivunen namuttelee @OulunKarpatFi:n illan kolmannen! 🍬🔥

📺 @MTVUrheilu | #Liiga #Kärpät pic.twitter.com/8OzWeQusPd

— Liiga (@smliiga) November 25, 2023

Excellent awareness to intercept the clearing attempt, and then the patience to hang onto the puck, push into a prime scoring area, and bury it on the back hand. What a wonderful sequence.

Koivunen first gained my notice this past summer when I was poring over Lassi Alanen's tracking data from European leagues. He was near the top in almost every offensive category, especially those related to passing and playmaking, and also profiled well on the defensive side.

It is great to see the Canes prospect and analytics darling (are those synonymous?) continuing to produce this year in a difficult league. Koivunen is in the first year of a three-year contract, after which he will be a Restricted Free Agent. Fingers crossed that we see him in the AHL before long so that he can start getting NHL call-ups, joining countrymen Sebastian Aho, Jesperi Kotkaniemi, and Teuvo Teravainen in Raleigh. His high IQ game should translate very nicely to the Canes' style.

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KHL

The top of the KHL leaderboard is a who's who of failed/former NHLers: Nikolai Goldobin, Vladimir Tkachyov, Jordan Weal, Reid Boucher, Ryan Spooner, and Nikita Gusev make up the top six. I realize there are much more advanced statistical methods for comparing the relative competitive strength of pro hockey leagues, but those players leading the league makes me wonder how the NHL ever lost big names like Jaromir Jagr, Ilya Kovalchuk, and Alexander Radulov to the KHL. It certainly doesn't feel like such a threat anymore.

The NHL prospects consistently lighting the lamp in the KHL to kick off 2023-24 include Alexander Nikishin (CAR, 25 in 33), Matvei Michkov (PHI, 24 in 28), Daniila Yurov (MIN, 23 in 30), and Ivan Morozov (VGK, 31 in 30).

I simply can't wait for Nikishin to get going with the Canes. He really feels like the next big thing in fantasy—potentially Mo Seider 2.0. And Seider is a bit of a unicorn in terms of offering both point production and robust category coverage, so I mean that as realistic high praise.

Nikishin is constantly looking to throw a big hit, he has excellent puck-moving instincts, and he can launch absolute bombs from the point. His arrival should coincide almost perfectly with Brent Burns' decline in Carolina, and there is not a ton of competition in the Canes' system from other blueliners besides Scott Morrow. He is a well-known commodity by now, however, so if you don't already own him, he won't be cheap to acquire.

I touched on Yurov at the end of October, so I'll just add that he has upped his point pace a fair ways since then from 0.68 points per game to 0.77, largely because he has scored an insane 11 points over his last eight games. He has seen over 17 minutes of ice time the last three games and seems to have firmly established himself as one of the Metallurg's top offensive weapons. Not bad for a teenager.

Yurov increasingly looks like a can't-miss-level star prospect. He was already an analytics darling back in his draft year, and once the HP model adds in this year's data, his star potential should be back above 50% again. It is getting easier and easier to imagine a Yurov-Rossi-Kaprizov line in the near future.

I don't often touch on Michkov for the same reason I usually avoid writing about Bedard: their greatness is self-apparent. You can quibble about the details, but Michkov is going to be an all-star. The only painful part is the waiting. Kaprizov 2.0.

Ivan Morozov is an interesting player. Now 23, drafted a million years ago in 2018, in the final year of his two-year contract with Vegas. It feels like he took a significant step backwards this year by returning to Russia after an underwhelming AHL campaign last year with Henderson (17 in 58).

But now he has 31 points in 30 games for Spartak Moskva playing alongside former Canucks prospect Goldobin. His NHL outlook seems quite poor at this point, but he was always billed as more of a two-way, bottom-six type. As in, the level of production we are seeing from him this year in the KHL seems somewhat out of character.

Is there a chance that the Golden Knights re-sign him and he crosses back over to the AHL/NHL again after this year? There are actually quite a few parallels here to what the Avalanche are doing with Nikolai Kovalenko (who has 24 points in 18 KHL games this year, by the way). Kovalenko is actually a year older than Morozov but likewise is expected to have an impact in a middle-six role as soon as next year.

While I get the sense that Kovalenko has a brighter NHL future than Morozov, I'll be keeping an eye on how the rest of the year unfolds for the Vegas prospect. There might still be a player here.

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