'Air of unpredictability' after Schaefer and Misa in McKenzie's Draft Ranking

Matthew Schaefer.

Michael Misa.

Beyond those top two prospects — Schaefer is the unanimous No. 1 on TSN’s final rankings; Misa is the near-unanimous No. 2, receiving nine of 10 second-place votes — there is a real air of unpredictability as it relates to the rest of the 2025 NHL draft.

Even within the top 10.

Mind you, that unpredictability is somewhat paradoxical.

Which is to suggest this: Identifying the top 10 prospects this year is rather easy, bordering on obvious.

If you look at TSN’s final list, and then check any of the myriad independent scouting lists elsewhere, you’re pretty much going to find the same eight to 10 names immediately following Schaefer and Misa.

Something along these lines:

Brampton Steelhead right winger Porter Martone (No. 3 on the TSN list); Swedish centre Anton Frondell (No. 4); Moncton Wildcat centre Caleb Desnoyers (No. 5); Brantford Bulldog centre Jake O’Brien (No. 6); Boston College centre James Hagens (No. 7); Soo Greyhound centre Brady Martin (No. 8); Brandon Wheat King centre Roger McQueen (No. 9); and Swedish right winger Victor Eklund (No. 10).

There may be the odd list that has Seattle Thunderbird defenceman Radim Mrtka (No. 11) , Tri-City American defenceman Jackson Smith (No. 12) or Barrie Colt defenceman Kashawn Aitcheson (No. 13) in the Top 10.

But it would be tough to find a top 10 list that is devoid of any one of Martone, Frondell, Desnoyers, O’Brien, Hagens, Martin and McQueen. In fact, of those seven players, only two — Martin and McQueen — got a single vote outside the top 10 from our panel of 10 NHL scouts.

That is an unusually strong consensus.

But how is each of this Group of Seven viewed within the top 10?

Well, now, there’s the unpredictability factor and the reason why no one seems to have any idea what order they will be taken June 27 in Los Angeles.

“It’s a weird dynamic this year,” said one NHL head scout. “You’ve got Schaefer at the top and then there’s a bit of a gap to Misa and then there’s a much bigger gap between those two and everyone else, but it seems there’s almost no gap between the [No. 3 to No. 9] guys. One big winger (Martone) and six really good centres [Frondell, Desnoyers, Hagens, O’Brien, Martin and McQueen].”

“I think we can all agree,” said another NHL scout, “that outside of Schaefer, who has a chance to be elite, and maybe Misa, too, it’s still an above-average top 10 because it’s dominated by talented centres. But I’ll bet each team’s order of how they rank those nine or 10 players is all over the map.”

It is.

One player (Schaefer) received votes at No. 1

Two players - Misa and Frondell - received votes at No. 2.

Three players - Martone, Frondell and Desnoyers - received votes at No. 3.

Six players received votes at No. 4. Six players received votes at No. 5.

Seven players received votes at No. 6. Seven players received votes at No. 7.

Five players received votes at No. 8. Seven players received votes at No. 9.

And eight players received votes at No. 10.

This is not just the Matthew Schaefer Draft; it’s the Scattershot Draft.

Let’s take a closer look at TSN’s Top 10.

3. Porter Martone

The 6-foot-3, 208-pound Steelhead winger has the size, strength and skill to project as an NHL power forward, though scouts are evenly split on whether he’ll be a first or second liner. He does his best work close to the net and can be a hard guy to play against, but scouts would like to see that on a more consistent basis.

“He’s got a big shot,” said a scout. “His skating is somewhat average, but he moves okay. He can be a skilled big man who can be an agitator, too, but he sometimes has a tendency to want to ‘skill’ things up too much.”

4. Anton Frondell

The 6-foot-1, 198-pound Djurgarden centre, as noted, was the only player besides Misa to get a second-place vote.

He battled illness and injury this season and didn’t play particularly well at the World U-18 Championship in April against his own age group. But Frondell still scored 11 goals and 25 points in 29 games against men in the Sweden’s second-level Allsvenskan to help lead Djurgarden’s promotion to the SHL next season.

That production represented the second best points-per-game (.86) output by a draft-eligible player in Allsvenskan history, behind only Vancouver Canuck forward Elias Pettersson.

“He’s not as big as Anze Kopitar or Sasha Barkov, but he has a chance to be that type of player and make a big impact at both ends of the ice,” said one scout who projects Frondell as a potential first-line NHL centre.

Most view him as a second-line centre, though a couple of others believe he’d be better suited on the wing in the NHL.

5. Caleb Desnoyers

The 6-foot-2, 178-pound centre put up nice offensive numbers (84 points in 56 games) and led the Wildcats to the QMJHL championship, but it’s his strong two-way play, with and without the puck, that has him projected as a high-end, second-line NHL centre.

He received votes as high as No. 3 and no lower than No. 9.

“Plays a similar style to Patrice Bergeron,” said one scout. “He was Canada’s best forward at the Hlinka [U-18 tournament] last summer.”

Desnoyers did finish the season dealing with injuries. While he was able to play in the QMJHL playoffs and the Memorial Cup, he had wrist issues, which prevented him from participating in some of the physical testing/activities at the NHL Central Scouting Combine in Buffalo earlier this month.

6. Jake O’Brien

At 6-foot-2 and 172 pounds, the Bulldog centre is not yet fully developed physically but is viewed by scouts as having elite hockey sense and extraordinary playmaking abilities.

“He makes plays where you wonder if he has eyes in the back of his head,” said one scout. “He’ll make a [no-look] play where you think it was just luck, but if you watch the video back, you’ll see he took a quick look before making the pass.

O’Brien was ranked as high as No. 4, no lower than No. 9, and projects as a rangy, skilled second-line NHL centre who is lights out from the half wall on the power play. On the flip side, some scouts would like to see more consistent five-on-five production.

But with that big frame and big brain, he’s viewed as having a high ceiling.

7. James Hagens

The Boston College 5-foot-11, 177-pound freshman centre is trending, but in the wrong direction.

He was No. 1 on TSN’s 2025 Pre-Season Draft Rankings, securing nine of 10 votes last September; he slipped to No. 2 in our mid-season rankings in January, getting seven of 10 second-place votes; he was down to No. 5 on our Draft Lottery Edition rankings in May and now he finds himself at No. 7.

While Hagens’ stock has dipped, don’t forget what we said about the players ranked from No. 3 to 9. There is very little separating them.

Nevertheless, Hagens getting all his votes between Nos. 5 and 10 reflects some degree of trepidation.

Some of that has to do with the fact he got off to a slow start at Boston College in the fall. Some of it is because he’s the only one of the six centres in the top 10 who stands under 6 feet tall. He was good, occasionally very good, but not great, for Team USA during the World Junior Championship.

And there’s no question the competition from the bigger centres (Misa, Frondell, Desnoyers, O’Brien, Martin and McQueen) is a factor.

Still, his puck skills, hockey sense and skating are above average, and some scouts noted that while his stock has fallen, he remains a top 10 prospect not to be slept on. The consensus NHL projection amongst our panel ranged from second-line centre to second-line winger to middle-six forward.

“Someone is going to walk into a really good player who’s going to put up a lot of points in the NHL,” said one scout.

Since he’s a Long Island boy, and the Islanders have the No. 1 overall pick, there is a sentiment, certainly amongst Islanders fans, to consider him as an alternative to Schaefer and/or Misa. It’s a nice storyline but most of our scouts surveyed said they couldn’t imagine the Islanders passing on Schaefer or Misa for Hagens.

8. Brady Martin

The solid 6-foot, 178-pound Greyhound pivot is a throwback player.

Martin is not expected to be in Los Angeles for the draft – instead staying on the family farm in Elora, Ont., to celebrate the occasion. He is a punishing hitter with relentless drive and energy.

But he is also a strong skater who can make plays and score goals — 33 goals and 72 points in 57 OHL games this season — and the consensus projection from our panel is gritty second-line forward. A couple of scouts did wonder if he might not be a better NHL winger than centre and a couple more thought he might be more of a middle-six forward than top six.

But make no mistake, his star has been on the rise. Anyone who watched the Florida Panthers’ relentless drive to their second consecutive Stanley Cup could easily envision Martin playing just that sort of game in the NHL one day. He may well be getting a Conn Smythe-winning Sam Bennett bump.

9. Roger McQueen

The towering 6-foot-5, 197-pound Wheat King centre is not only competing with five other high-end centres within the top 10, he’s trying to skate out from under an injury-related cloud.

McQueen played only 20 games this season – 17 in the regular season and three in the playoffs for Brandon - most notably because of a back problem.

Originally diagnosed as a disc issue, it was later discovered to be a stress fracture. He subsequently dealt with a back muscle strain.

McQueen said he was pain-free and feeling great by late April. He was cleared and able to take part in all physical testing at the NHL combine in the first week of June, which along with his medical records may have helped to allay some fears that he’s Cayden Lindstrom 2.0.

Lindstrom, a Medicine Hat Tiger centre who missed much of the 2023-24 season because of a back injury, was taken fourth overall by Columbus in the 2024 draft. His back issues continued this season and he played zero regular-season games for the Tigers and only four WHL playoff games, plus three more in the Memorial Cup.

The Lindstrom experience has scouts wary of McQueen.

We asked our panel of scouts how comfortable they would be in taking McQueen where they currently have him rated, bearing in mind that eight of the 10 scouts ranked him between Nos. 4 and 10.

“I don’t think I’d be comfortable [taking McQueen] until between 15 and 25,” said a scout who ranked him No. 11.

Teams will often rank an injured player where they believe he should be slotted if he’s injury-free and amend that on draft day when they have the latest information from doctors.

One of the scouts who ranked McQueen fourth overall — and there were two who did  — said he would be comfortable taking McQueen there.

Another said he wouldn’t take McQueen in the top five but would be more comfortable from No. 6 onwards.

“The [medical] reports seem to indicate they’ve figured out the problem and it’s not that serious,” added another scout.

But another said the spectre of Lindstrom hangs over McQueen.

“With so many other viable options in the top 10,” said the scout, “why would you take the risk? Sure, at some point, the risk-reward becomes attractive, but I’m not sure when exactly that happens.”

So, if McQueen slips on draft day, that’s the reason. The majority of scouts we talked to admitted a healthy McQueen could be a game-changer.

“Big and skilled, skates well, a potential No. 2 NHL centre who could put up numbers,” said a scout.

“If McQueen is healthy, I think the top 10 of this draft is [collectively] above average but without him at 100 per cent, I think it’s an average group,” added another scout. “He could be that good.”

10. Victor Eklund

The Djurgarden winger and younger brother of San Jose Shark William Eklund, had a strong season, posting 19 goals and 31 points in 42 games playing against men in the Allsvenskan League.

Some scouts would tell you, on balance, he outplayed higher-ranked teammate and countryman Frondell, but at 5-foot-11 and161 pounds, Eklund gets discounted because of the NHL’s sub-6 foot bias.

Still, he tries to play bigger. He has high energy and matches it with high skill and speed. Our panel is split almost evenly whether he’s going to be a second-line winger or a middle-six forward.

If the air of unpredictability on how the top 10 will unfold is noticeable, it’s nothing compared to how chaotic the draft may look beyond the top 10 or dozen prospects.

“The quality of the player you get between 11 and 20 may not be that different than the player you get between 20 and 30 or even 30 to 40,” said a scout. “I really like the top 10 to maybe 15, but after that it’s a whole lot of average.”

Added another: “When you have no idea who gets selected from about 20 to 60, or in what order, and even the 10 to 30 order looks like it’s all over the place, well, that says to me it’s a below-average group. Lots of support players and foot soldiers, who are important to have, but very few difference-makers and generals who move the needle in a big way.”

Still, it’s an intriguing draft for a plethora of reasons:

- It’s generally viewed as an above-average class of goaltenders, even though we didn’t rank a stopper in the top 32.

Prince George Cougar netminder Joshua Ravensbergen, all 6-foot-5 and 190 pounds of him, is No. 34 on our final ranking. He’s certainly capable of being drafted in the first round — four of our 10 scouts ranked him in bottom third of the first round — and the truth is that a lot of the prospects ranked between 33 and 46 are interchangeable with those in the bottom third of the top 32.

Six goaltenders are ranked in TSN’s Top 60, including Ravensbergen, Brampton Steelhead Jack Ivankovic (No. 45); Russians Semyon Frolov (No. 57) and Pyotr Andreyanov (No. 58) and London Knight Aleksei Medvedev (No. 59), plus Tri-City American Michal Pradel (No. 71).

While Ravensbergen and Ivankovic are the top two in terms of consensus, Frolov, Andreyanov and Medvedev are ranked ahead of Ravensbergen and/or Ivankovic on some teams’ lists.

“This year’s goalie class is above average, but there’s no elite guy,” said one scout. “The depth is very good, though.”

One scout ventured that a lot of goalies will be taken in the second and third round this year, in part because they’re solid prospects, but also because the class of skaters is trending towards below average.

- In any draft ranking, the players forecasted to be taken in the first round (top 32) are perceived to be a distinct cut above those rated in the second round.

But that can be a little misleading, and it certainly is this year.

On TSN’s final list, of the 14 players ranked between Nos. 33 and 46, all but two received some first round consideration from our panel of scouts.

Half of those in that group received multiple first-round votes, most notably Team USA U-18 program winger No. 33 Jack Murtagh (five votes) , No. 34 Ravensbergen (four), No. 35 Russian right winger Alexander Zharovsky (five), No. 36 Russian right winger Daniil Prokhorov (3), No. 39 Czechia winger Vaclav Nestrasil (three) of Muskegon in the USHL and at No. 46, the giant 6-foot-6, 215-pound Minnesota high school centre Mason West (two).

(West, incidentally, is an acclaimed quarterback who will finish his senior year with Edina in the fall before joining the Fargo Force of the USHL at the beginning of 2026. He recently announced his commitment to play hockey at Michigan State for the 2026-27 season.)

This suggests that those prospects between Nos. 33 and 46 may well be interchangeable with the players ranked in the top 32, most notably those in the 26-32 range.

- While scouts are bemoaning having only one potentially elite defenceman in TSN’s Top 10 – Schaefer at No. 1 – four of the five prospects ranked between 11 and 15 are defencemen and some of them may be threats to jump into the top 10 for a team that may be predisposed to want a blueliner.

No. 11 Radim Mrtka is a towering Czech highly regarded for his strong skating, two-way play and ability to skate and move the puck efficiently on breakouts. He ranged from  Nos.10 to 14 on our scouts’ ballots.

No. 12 Jackson Smith has an NHL frame and is among the very best skaters in the draft. He also has a bomb for a shot. He was ranked as high as No. 6 and as low as No. 25

A lot of scouts are really enthused about strong-skating Barrie Colt Kashawn Aitcheson. At 6-foot-2 and 196 pounds, the No. 13-ranked prospect is a punishing hitter who will drop the gloves and scored 26 goals for the Colts. His range was No. 11 to 18.

The fourth defenceman in the No.11-15 range is solid 6-foot-2, 192-pound University of Wisconsin freshman Logan Hensler (No. 15), who is a good skater and known for his defence-first play. His range was No. 11 to 38.

- If you’re looking for a reason to take TSN pre-season rankings with a grain of salt, look no further than last September when Russian forward Ivan Ryabkin was slotted No. 5, Erie Otter winger Malcolm Spence, No. 8, and U.S. U-18 program centre Will Moore, No. 11.

Each of these players has slipped in the rankings.

While Ryabkin received a couple of first-round votes from our panel, his consensus ranking is No. 41. Ryabkin was getting lofty comparisons to Matvei Michkov and Ivan Demidov to start the season but ending up leaving his Russian team to play in the USHL and struggled to find his footing there. He’s now viewed as something of a wild card.

It’s not inconceivable that Moore, No. 40 on our final list, could break into the top 32 on draft day but all 10 scouts we surveyed ranked him between No. 35 and 50. No one has anything particularly bad to say about Moore other than questions being asked about his offensive upside.

The most curious case, though, is that of Spence, who is No. 25 on our final ranking.

He’s a strong skating, physical winger who contributes offensively. He’s a solidly built 6-foot-1 and 203 pounds, and he plays a hard two-way game. He scored 32 goals and 72 points in 65 games for an Erie team that was without Matthew Schaefer for most of the season, went through a coaching change in mid-season, and also had to deal with the sudden death of revered owner Jim Waters.

On top of all that, Spence played through a severe mouth injury that saw him lose more than 10 pounds mid-season while having to wear full facial protection, but he only missed three regular-season games.

He’s still very much a first-round consideration — seven of 10 scouts ranked him No. 21 to 30 but three had him in the 40s — so he’ll be an intriguing prospect to follow on draft day.

- One forward who is surging in the eyes of scouts big 6-foot-4, 185-pound Windsor Spitfire centre Jack Nesbitt, No. 17 in our final ranking.

Even though Nesbitt hasn’t fully filled out yet and his skating needs work, he’s becoming an easy projection because he plays a hard physical game, scored 25 goals, and averaged almost a point a game as a second liner in Windsor.

One scout ranked him as high as No. 8 overall, five more slotted him somewhere in the teens and no one had him lower than No. 28. He’s another guy to watch on draft day because of the increased buzz of late.

— It’s not unusual in any given year to have a few players ranked outside of, say, the top 50 to get a vote from a scout or two in the first round.

But there seems to be an uptick in the number of that type of player this season.

So if any of the following prospects get taken in the first round, don’t say you weren’t given advance notice of the possibility. Each of these players got one first-round vote:

51. Team USA U-18 defenceman Carter Amico (26th)

55. Moscow Dynamo defenceman Kurban Limatov (19th)

56. Swift Current Bronco defenceman Peyton Kettles (32nd)

63. Djurgarden Junior centre Theo Stockselius (21st)

64. Owen Sound Attack defenceman David Bedkowski (32nd)

68. Farjestad Junior defenceman Malte Vass (28th)

75. Assat Junior defenceman Lasse Boelius (29th)

HM: Yekaterinburg Junior left winger Dmitri Isayev (27th)

- One last note on these TSN rankings, and it’s the annual explanation for the purpose and methodology that has been used by me since I started ranking prospects in the mid 1980s at The Hockey News.

These are consensus rankings obtained by surveying 10 NHL scouts to get a strictly numerical projection of where they would slot the prospects on draft day. Historically, it has been a decent proxy for what range players are most often taken in the draft.

These rankings are done in a vacuum, which is to suggest the NHL clubs’ order of selection on draft day plays no part whatsoever in where a player gets ranked.

For example, if an NHL club announced two weeks before the draft which player it was taking No. 1 overall, but our survey of NHL scouts said a different player was No. 1, we would go with what the survey said.

It is largely an objective exercise.

Enjoy the draft!