The Edmonton Oilers’ prospects saw plenty of action this past week. With a limited amount of games across all leagues, we had to give this week’s spotlight to the little discussed Shane Lachance. Let’s dive right into it!
Welcome to the TOR Edmonton Oilers prospect update. Each week, we’ll take a dive into how the Oilers’ prospects have done in their respective leagues. We have defined a prospect as a skater who has played fewer than 65 NHL games, and is younger than 25 years of age. All data is from EliteProspects. We also use an NHLe calculator built by Christian Roatis (@Croatis) which is used to estimate a player’s equivalent point total in the NHL based on how they are performing in their respective league. The calculator uses the difficulty of the given league combined with the ease at which a player puts up points to determine the NHLe.
Taking a look at Lachance’s season
We have not checked in on Shane Lachance much, but the 2021 sixth rounder has had a notable start to his sophomore USHL season. Due in part to his geographically strange birthday in late August, Lachance finds himself as a 19-year-old in a league that we are used to seeing top end 17-year-olds excel with the USNTDP, which takes on a combination of USHL teams and NCAA teams.
That being said, with 16 goals through 21 games Lachance is having great success. Unfortunately for Lachance’s stock as a prospect, his successes at this level may not be regarded much. It is easier to see how the hype surrounding him would grow were he to use it as a springboard by continuing these strong results as a 20-year-old in his NCAA freshman season, for example.
A classic weave concept off the rush, Lachance moves laterally to find quiet ice. A big body at 6’4”, it is encouraging to see a deft shot off the front foot in stride.
Here we see Lachance fighting for a net front position, willing to engage in physical battles, eventually using the net to free himself up, finding himself in the perfect position to corral the rebound as the shot comes. Again we see some ability to find quiet ice, a talent present in many goal scorers.
To emphasise this we hear the play-by-play announcer refer to him as “the god of goals”, clearly an endorsement of his production this season.
Another clip of Lachance finding quiet ice, this time finishing with a great delivery on the one timer with his trailing knee on the ice. It’s clear that there is some shorting talent here, providing some hope his scoring will continue at higher levels. The ability to decisively alter one’s release opens more shooting angles and options.
Shooting ability seems to be an area the Oilers scouting staff appreciates, with notable prospects such as Matvey Petrov, Reid Schaefer, Xavier Bourgault, and even Jake Chiasson boasting notable aptitudes in this area.
In all, Lachance is a fairly deep cut as it pertains to Oilers prospects, at least for the time being. There is still a long way to go along his development, but there is a path that might see Lachance’s profile raised at this point next season. The most optimistic projections would see Lachance work his way up through the NCAA and AHL for a season or two each, before ultimately having a realistic shot at competing for an NHL spot.
This and That
AHL
The Bakersfield Condors played but one game this past week, falling 2–0 to the Ontario Reign. Another game between the two teams was postponed for safety reasons.
Olivier Rodrigue did well in stopping 23 of 24 shots, as an empty net goal was added by Ontario late. The recently demoted Cal Peterson did well, earning the first star with his shutout.
We’ve seen quite a few saves like this from Rodrigue this season, a highlight variety save that shows a lot of strong fundamentals. From tracking the puck well as it’s passed around, Rodrigue commands his edges, remains square to the shot, exuding ease and poise in moving laterally to stop one timers.
Somehow Rodrigue manages to keep the puck out here. Falling and sprawling, it looks dicey to start, but it’s clear Rodrigue’s senses kick back in, adjusting himself and kicking the pad out to thwart the last of the onslaught.
OHL
Matvey Petrov added three points across his three games this week, which is slower than his pace so far this season. The North Bay Battalion won all three of their games, continuing to be among the OHL’s best teams this season. There is a chance we might see a deep playoff run, maybe even a Memorial Cup appearance for the Battalion, which would be a great showcase for Oilers fans to check out Petrov.
NHLe Leaderboard
NHLe is a metric used to estimate a player’s offensive output at the NHL level from their point totals in their respective league. Here are the Oilers’ current top five (bracketed numbers denote movement from the previous week).
- Tyler Benson 39.9 (1)
- Matvey Petrov 33.4 (2)
- Reid Schaefer 30.5 (3)
- Maxim Beryozkin 28.3 (4)
- James Hamblin 23.9 (5)
Overall regular season totals for Oilers’ prospects
Forwards
| Player | Team | League | GP | G | A | TP | PPG | PIM | +/- | NHLeLeague | NHLe |
| Tyler Benson (LW) | Bakersfield Condors | AHL | 6 | 0 | 6 | 6 | 1 | 4 | 0 | AHL | 39.9 |
| Maxim Beryozkin (LW/RW) | Lokomotiv Yaroslavl | KHL | 28 | 4 | 8 | 12 | 0.43 | 10 | 6 | KHL | 28.3 |
| Molot Perm | VHL | 9 | 3 | 3 | 6 | 0.67 | 4 | 2 | VHL | 20.9 | |
| Xavier Bourgault (C) | Bakersfield Condors | AHL | 24 | 8 | 5 | 13 | 0.54 | 6 | -2 | ECAC | 12.4 |
| Skyler Brind’Amour (C) | Quinnipiac Univ. | NCAA | 18 | 7 | 7 | 14 | 0.78 | 2 | 9 | ||
| Jake Chiasson (C/RW) | Brandon Wheat Kings | WHL | 31 | 9 | 15 | 24 | 0.77 | 10 | -21 | WHL | 19.1 |
| Jason Demers (D) | Bakersfield Condors | AHL | 24 | 0 | 9 | 9 | 0.38 | 32 | -4 | AHL | 15.1 |
| Maxim Denezhkin (C) | totals | 21 | 4 | 5 | 9 | 0.43 | 70 | -4 | totals | ||
| Seth Griffith (C/RW) | Bakersfield Condors | AHL | 24 | 6 | 16 | 22 | 0.92 | 14 | -4 | AHL | 36.7 |
| James Hamblin (LW/C) | Bakersfield Condors | AHL | 15 | 3 | 6 | 9 | 0.6 | 2 | -1 | AHL | 23.9 |
| Mattias Janmark (C/W) | Bakersfield Condors | AHL | 4 | 2 | 2 | 4 | 1 | 2 | 3 | AHL | 39.9 |
| Klim Kostin (LW/RW) | Bakersfield Condors | AHL | 9 | 2 | 2 | 4 | 0.44 | 15 | -4 | AHL | 17.5 |
| Shane Lachance (LW) | Youngstown Phantoms | USHL | 23 | 16 | 5 | 21 | 0.91 | 10 | 0 | USHL | 20.1 |
| Raphaël Lavoie (C/RW) | Bakersfield Condors | AHL | 13 | 2 | 1 | 3 | 0.23 | 6 | -4 | AHL | 9.2 |
| Jeremias Lindewall (RW/LW) | Östersunds IK | HockeyAllsvenskan | 19 | 1 | 3 | 4 | 0.21 | 6 | -10 | ECAC | 4.8 |
| Brad Malone (C/LW) | Bakersfield Condors | AHL | 11 | 1 | 3 | 4 | 0.36 | 18 | 1 | AHL | 14.3 |
| Tomas Mazura (C) | St. Lawrence Univ. | NCAA | 13 | 2 | 3 | 5 | 0.39 | 4 | 2 | Hockey East | 12.6 |
| Greg McKegg (C/W) | Bakersfield Condors | AHL | 24 | 1 | 5 | 6 | 0.25 | 24 | 1 | Hockey East | 8.1 |
| Joel Määttä (C) | Univ. of Vermont | NCAA | 18 | 3 | 2 | 5 | 0.28 | 14 | -2 | ||
| Matvei Petrov (RW/LW) | North Bay Battalion | OHL | 31 | 11 | 28 | 39 | 1.26 | 20 | 14 | OHL | 33.4 |
| Noah Philp (C) | Bakersfield Condors | AHL | 23 | 3 | 1 | 4 | 0.17 | 4 | 4 | AHL | 6.8 |
| Carter Savoie (LW) | Bakersfield Condors | AHL | 18 | 3 | 2 | 5 | 0.28 | 8 | -5 | AHL | 11.2 |
| Reid Schaefer (LW) | Seattle Thunderbirds | WHL | 22 | 15 | 12 | 27 | 1.23 | 36 | 11 | WHL | 30.5 |
| Tyler Tullio (C/RW) | Bakersfield Condors | AHL | 21 | 4 | 3 | 7 | 0.33 | 4 | 0 | AHL | 13.2 |
Defencemen
| Player | Team | League | GP | G | A | TP | PPG | PIM | +/- | NHLeLeague | NHLe |
| Philip Broberg (D) | Bakersfield Condors | AHL | 7 | 2 | 2 | 4 | 0.57 | 0 | -2 | AHL | 22.7 |
| Vincent Desharnais (D) | Bakersfield Condors | AHL | 6 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 0.17 | 17 | 1 | AHL | 6.8 |
| Philip Kemp (D) | Bakersfield Condors | AHL | 24 | 3 | 6 | 9 | 0.38 | 15 | 2 | AHL | 15.1 |
| Michael Kesselring (D) | Bakersfield Condors | AHL | 24 | 8 | 3 | 11 | 0.46 | 28 | 1 | AHL | 18.3 |
| Slater Koekkoek (D) | Bakersfield Condors | AHL | – | – | – | – | – | – | – | AHL | |
| Luca Münzenberger (D) | Univ. of Vermont | NCAA | 14 | 0 | 4 | 4 | 0.29 | 14 | -6 | ||
| Markus Niemeläinen (D) | Bakersfield Condors | AHL | 10 | 0 | 2 | 2 | 0.2 | 6 | 2 | AHL | 8.0 |
| Maximus Wanner (D) | Moose Jaw Warriors | WHL | 25 | 6 | 17 | 23 | 0.92 | 26 | 21 | WHL | 22.8 |
| Nikita Yevseyev (D) | totals | 34 | 5 | 1 | 6 | 0.18 | 13 | 9 | totals | ||
| Ak Bars Kazan | KHL | 33 | 5 | 1 | 6 | 0.18 | 11 | 2 | KHL | 11.9 |
Goalies
| Player | Team | League | GP | GAA | SV% |
| Olivier Rodrigue | Bakersfield Condors | AHL | 13 | 2.8 | 0.918 |
| Samuel Jonsson | Rögle BK J20 | J20 Nationell | 17 | 2.26 | 0.908 |
| Ryan Fanti | totals | 11 | |||
| Bakersfield Condors | AHL | 5 | 3.57 | 0.893 | |
| Calvin Pickard | Bakersfield Condors | AHL | 8 | 3.12 | 0.899 |
Which prospects are you most excited about? Let us know below in the comments or on social media.
