Prospect Info: U-20 Tournament - Rus/Fin/Swe/Cze 8-23/8-25

[dackelljuneaubulis02]

man he's gonna be good

 

[Adam Michaels]

Romanov on the top pairing again with the "A" on his jersey in Russia's game against Sweden.

 

[Adam Michaels]

Here's the stream for the game:

 

[Sthabs]

Kid was dominant during that first, big hit, interceptions, nice reads

 

[Adam Michaels]

 

[Goldenhands]

Amirov wearing #27?

Edit: Dorofeyev is 27...

 

[Sthabs]

Not a very good 2nd Imo, made a terrible pass at the O blue line that pinned his team for like 30 seconds 4vs4, then got a penalty on a pretty weak hooking call 2 minutes after, but almost sent one of his teammates on a breakaway on an excellent pass.

 

[canadiensnation]

 

[Kshahdoo]

Doesn't his skating kinda remind Letang's? When I watched Letang last time 5 or 6 years ago, he did similar things. Of course, Letang's IQ wasn't great, but he compensated it with his speed, and his offensive rushes were beautiful. Hope, Romanov won't have that IQ problem.

 

[WeThreeKings]

I'm not gonna get too concerned about decision making at the beginning of the season. It's not a critique that I've had for him in his draft year or his last year, so I'm thinking it's probably rust.

 

[Adam Michaels]

Anyone know anything about Felix Carenfelt of Sweden? He went undrafted the last two drafts he was eligible. He will play at Merrimack in the NCAA this season.

He's 5'10" and 185 lbs. Is an LW. He is 19 years old.

Looking at his stats on Elite Prospects, he seems to produce pretty much every level he's played in.

Last season, he played for Djurgardens J20 and was a point-per-game player. He has 41 pts (19G, 22A) in 41 GP.

Felix Carenfelt at eliteprospects.com

 

[Le Barron de HF]

Anyone know anything about Felix Carenfelt of Sweden? He went undrafted the last two drafts he was eligible. He will play at Merrimack in the NCAA this season.

He's 5'10" and 185 lbs. Is an LW. He is 19 years old.

Looking at his stats on Elite Prospects, he seems to produce pretty much every level he's played in.

Last season, he played for Djurgardens J20 and was a point-per-game player. He has 41 pts (19G, 22A) in 41 GP.

Felix Carenfelt at eliteprospects.com

Pretty weird, not much info on him. Found this:
Both are excellent goal scorers with above average playmaking skills that likes to take initiative in the offensive zone, and together they are one of the reasons why Djurgården was the top team in the northern division. (BLOG: A deep-dive into the Swedish Under-20 development leagues). Also first time he's ever been mentioned on this site in years. Odd.

 

[Intangir]

I just finished watching the SWE-RUS game (thanks Adam Michaels) and here's a couple of things that jumped out to me. Sweden was a much tougher opponent to beat for Russia than the Czechs even though they got blanked as the russian players had much less time and space to make plays and look good doing it, meaning that aside from some very few (Podkolzin was much better) everyone looked worse this game than last, Romanov included. That said, he was still very solid overall despite the harder matchup.,he was just a bit less impactful on offense than he was in game one and made more mistakes.

The swedish team had the marvelous idea to (again) not show their players' names over the number on the jerseys, choosing instead to show a sponsor's name, and I got real tired of always seeing ''Beijer Byggmaterial'' every time a swede had his back turned to the camera over the course of the game, which made me realize that we're blessed in the NHL to not have to deal with that stuff yet on the uniforms.

#21 (Nils Hoglander, going by the swedish national team roster) was heads, shoulders and torso above every other player on Sweden all game long, making beauty plays and being a pain in the @$$ to guard against with his shifiness, dangles and combativity. Incidentally, #21 managed to deflect a puck with his stick in an absolutely spectacular fashion that resulted in a goal at the end of the second period, only that didn't count as his stick was at least a foot if not two above the cross bar. He was the best player overall in this game for me, trailed behind by Podkolzin, who was a beast possession-wise and creating chances with simple yet efficient passing.

Not a very good 2nd Imo, made a terrible pass at the O blue line that pinned his team for like 30 seconds 4vs4, then got a penalty on a pretty weak hooking call 2 minutes after, but almost sent one of his teammates on a breakaway on an excellent pass.

I agree with most of what you said, and Romanov's pass was indeed intercepted, but I think that result was mostly the fault of his D-partner's poor decision in skating the puck into the half-boards before making a quick swivel pass at Romanov, his only option at that point off the faceoff and an option that was already under pressure by a swedish forward to boot, that was the cause of the error that lead to sustained pressure in the defensive zone for Russia. Sure, in optimal circumstances you would have liked to see Romanov dump the puck as fast as he could in the situation he was in, but he had very little time to decide and I won't be too hard on him for trying to redeem an error by a teammate in a positive way and won't label it outright as a ''bad play'', even though it wasn't a good play or the best idea for that matter and could have cost his team a goal.

Taking things in order, Romanov had a very, very strong first period, as Sthabs said, where he made many good plays, exhibited some stifling defense, took some ''meh'' decisions too and commited only a single bad play, an inaccurate pass to his partner in the defensive zone that stunted the breakout for his team but had no negative repercussions.

In the second, however, Romanov was uncharacteristically weak at distributing the puck, as his passes were sometimes errant, too strong to be received easily or simply ill-timed, and he simply wasn't as good as he can be. He still made some nice plays defensively and stripped the opponent of the puck a few times as well as block the passing lanes with gusto, but most of my attention was on him all game and I saw him make 4 bad plays in that period alone, equaling his total for the 4 periods before that in only twenty minutes. The first truly bad play that he made in the second was a shot that he took in the offensive zone that reached dead-center in the goalie's chest and had no chance at all of going in while Romanov had at least three very good passing options available to him and ample time and space to utilize them efficiently. As a result of his hastiness, a good-looking developing offense was stopped and there was an offensive faceoff that Sweden won, ending the russian pressure at that point. The second bad play that he made was a pass off transition that even a guy like prime Malkin couldn't handle that lead to an icing, a pass that he had all manners of time and space to make. The third mistake that I saw in that period was faulty positioning after a change that lead to a quick odd-man rush the other way by Sweden, a rush in which he also made his fourth mistake, which was trying to lift his opponent's stick from too far away attempting to make up for his prior mistake, which resulted in a penalty. Aside from those blunders and the ''not good'' plays that everyone makes Romanov still had some very good flashes, almost sending someone on a breakaway, swatting pucks with ease on his side of the defense, being physical in and around the net to deter opposing forwards and extremely feisty all-in-all, which was great to see.

There is one silver lining to this game in my opinion, greater than any other for us as Montreal Canadiens fans, and that is that Romanov came back very strong in the third period and he asserted himself much more for his team in transtion and everywhere else on the ice. Looking at him closely I could tell he was seemingly incensed about how he had played previously and I felt encouraged to know how high Romanov's standards were for his own play and how aware he was of his own faults and shortcomings. A good dedication to Hockey alongside these mental traits, physical talent and a good skill level usually make for some pretty good NHLers. I swear, that self-awareness and ability for introspection was like a breath of fresh air compared to a certain skilled forward that I've unfortunately gotten used to in Montreal, that is extremely annoying to me and that lacks that very same down-to-earth maturity despite being 5 years older, but let's not get into that right now. If Romanov made a single unforced ''true-blue bad play'' in this period, I did not see it. All I saw was hustle, determination, grit, good positioning, good defensive work despite some heavy opposition and buzzing in his zone, some nice work on breakouts, an extended shift prompted by his team's inability to gain the red line and dump the puck, and some very nice skating.

I would have more comments but I won't bore you with the details now lest you posters get annoyed at how long-winded I am, not that writing is a terribly demanding endeavor that leaves me winded, but still.

Anyways, cheers to you guys and I'm off to ZZZ-land where I hope Morpheus (the God, not Lawrence Fishburne) comes to visit and stays a while instead of just coming and going.

 

[montreal]

I watched some of the game when it was on and I just finished it, was surprised at how bad Russia looked considering this is Sweden's B team but credit to Sweden as they played a chippy game. I thought Podkolzin was the best player or most noticeable, he had a sick deke but didn't get off a very good shot. So many of Russia's forwards just didn't seem to do much of anything.

Romanov saw a good bit more time on the PP, he really seemed to be full of confidence as he had a few rushes up ice, several pinches, at least 2 shots but neither were very good. He almost got in a fight, had that huge hit which was a thing of beauty as he timed it perfectly.

I'll say this, in all the games i've seen of Romanov, MHL, KHL, international (U-18's/WJC's/4 Nations/CHL-Russia series) it's crazy how few mistakes he makes. Of course he makes mistakes but in all the games i've seen I don't think I can say i've ever seen him have a bad game. A bad period sure, as just today he didn't have the best 2nd period but overall it's so damn impressive how well he plays overall.

You really got to love what the Habs have done with their prospect pool. Out of Caufield, Suzuki, Brook, Primeau, Romanov, Poehling, any one of them could be our top prospect and it wouldn't surprise me out of any of them whatever one ends up being the best of the bunch. Then you still have Ylonen, Struble, Harris, Fleury. When you have 10 really solid prospects, with many having high upside that at least gives you a good place to start to build a contender some day hopefully.

 

[Le Barron de HF]

I just finished watching the SWE-RUS game (thanks Adam Michaels) and here's a couple of things that jumped out to me. Sweden was a much tougher opponent to beat for Russia than the Czechs even though they got blanked as the russian players had much less time and space to make plays and look good doing it, meaning that aside from some very few (Podkolzin was much better) everyone looked worse this game than last, Romanov included. That said, he was still very solid overall despite the harder matchup.,he was just a bit less impactful on offense than he was in game one and made more mistakes.

The swedish team had the marvelous idea to (again) not show their players' names over the number on the jerseys, choosing instead to show a sponsor's name, and I got real tired of always seeing ''Beijer Byggmaterial'' every time a swede had his back turned to the camera over the course of the game, which made me realize that we're blessed in the NHL to not have to deal with that stuff yet on the uniforms.

#21 (Nils Hoglander, going by the swedish national team roster) was heads, shoulders and torso above every other player on Sweden all game long, making beauty plays and being a pain in the @$$ to guard against with his shifiness, dangles and combativity. Incidentally, #21 managed to deflect a puck with his stick in an absolutely spectacular fashion that resulted in a goal at the end of the second period, only that didn't count as his stick was at least a foot if not two above the cross bar. He was the best player overall in this game for me, trailed behind by Podkolzin, who was a beast possession-wise and creating chances with simple yet efficient passing.



I agree with most of what you said, and Romanov's pass was indeed intercepted, but I think that result was mostly the fault of his D-partner's poor decision in skating the puck into the half-boards before making a quick swivel pass at Romanov, his only option at that point off the faceoff and an option that was already under pressure by a swedish forward to boot, that was the cause of the error that lead to sustained pressure in the defensive zone for Russia. Sure, in optimal circumstances you would have liked to see Romanov dump the puck as fast as he could in the situation he was in, but he had very little time to decide and I won't be too hard on him for trying to redeem an error by a teammate in a positive way and won't label it outright as a ''bad play'', even though it wasn't a good play or the best idea for that matter and could have cost his team a goal.

Taking things in order, Romanov had a very, very strong first period, as Sthabs said, where he made many good plays, exhibited some stifling defense, took some ''meh'' decisions too and commited only a single bad play, an inaccurate pass to his partner in the defensive zone that stunted the breakout for his team but had no negative repercussions.

In the second, however, Romanov was uncharacteristically weak at distributing the puck, as his passes were sometimes errant, too strong to be received easily or simply ill-timed, and he simply wasn't as good as he can be. He still made some nice plays defensively and stripped the opponent of the puck a few times as well as block the passing lanes with gusto, but most of my attention was on him all game and I saw him make 4 bad plays in that period alone, equaling his total for the 4 periods before that in only twenty minutes. The first truly bad play that he made in the second was a shot that he took in the offensive zone that reached dead-center in the goalie's chest and had no chance at all of going in while Romanov had at least three very good passing options available to him and ample time and space to utilize them efficiently. As a result of his hastiness, a good-looking developing offense was stopped and there was an offensive faceoff that Sweden won, ending the russian pressure at that point. The second bad play that he made was a pass off transition that even a guy like prime Malkin couldn't handle that lead to an icing, a pass that he had all manners of time and space to make. The third mistake that I saw in that period was faulty positioning after a change that lead to a quick odd-man rush the other way by Sweden, a rush in which he also made his fourth mistake, which was trying to lift his opponent's stick from too far away attempting to make up for his prior mistake, which resulted in a penalty. Aside from those blunders and the ''not good'' plays that everyone makes Romanov still had some very good flashes, almost sending someone on a breakaway, swatting pucks with ease on his side of the defense, being physical in and around the net to deter opposing forwards and extremely feisty all-in-all, which was great to see.

There is one silver lining to this game in my opinion, greater than any other for us as Montreal Canadiens fans, and that is that Romanov came back very strong in the third period and he asserted himself much more for his team in transtion and everywhere else on the ice. Looking at him closely I could tell he was seemingly incensed about how he had played previously and I felt encouraged to know how high Romanov's standards were for his own play and how aware he was of his own faults and shortcomings. A good dedication to Hockey alongside these mental traits, physical talent and a good skill level usually make for some pretty good NHLers. I swear, that self-awareness and ability for introspection was like a breath of fresh air compared to a certain skilled forward that I've unfortunately gotten used to in Montreal, that is extremely annoying to me and that lacks that very same down-to-earth maturity despite being 5 years older, but let's not get into that right now. If Romanov made a single unforced ''true-blue bad play'' in this period, I did not see it. All I saw was hustle, determination, grit, good positioning, good defensive work despite some heavy opposition and buzzing in the his zone, some nice work on breakouts, an extended shift prompted by his team's inability to gain the red line and dump the puck, and some very nice skating.

I would have more comments but I won't bore you with the details now lest you posters get annoyed at how long-winded I am, not that writing is a terribly demanding endeavor that leaves me winded, but still.

Anyways, cheers to you guys and I'm off to ZZZ-land where I hope Morpheus (the God, not Lawrence Fishburne) comes to visit and stays a while instead of just coming and going.

Cheers for the two well detailed reports, I liked that you had a good balance of praise but also criticism. Props for that.

 

[Treb]

Anyone know anything about Felix Carenfelt of Sweden? He went undrafted the last two drafts he was eligible. He will play at Merrimack in the NCAA this season.

He's 5'10" and 185 lbs. Is an LW. He is 19 years old.

Looking at his stats on Elite Prospects, he seems to produce pretty much every level he's played in.

Last season, he played for Djurgardens J20 and was a point-per-game player. He has 41 pts (19G, 22A) in 41 GP.

Felix Carenfelt at eliteprospects.com

He's listed for the NCAA in 2020-2021, not 2019-2020.

His draft year was meh. Legit players usually play most of their year in U20, not U18 and U18 Allvenskan.
Looking at the U20 in 2018-2019, the people in front of him are:
- 11 Undrafted 19-20 years old
- 1 2019 2nd rounder
- 1 2019 4th rounder
- 4 2020 probable 1st round picks

 

[Goldenhands]

I watched some of the game when it was on and I just finished it, was surprised at how bad Russia looked considering this is Sweden's B team but credit to Sweden as they played a chippy game. I thought Podkolzin was the best player or most noticeable, he had a sick deke but didn't get off a very good shot. So many of Russia's forwards just didn't seem to do much of anything.

Romanov saw a good bit more time on the PP, he really seemed to be full of confidence as he had a few rushes up ice, several pinches, at least 2 shots but neither were very good. He almost got in a fight, had that huge hit which was a thing of beauty as he timed it perfectly.

I'll say this, in all the games i've seen of Romanov, MHL, KHL, international (U-18's/WJC's/4 Nations/CHL-Russia series) it's crazy how few mistakes he makes. Of course he makes mistakes but in all the games i've seen I don't think I can say i've ever seen him have a bad game. A bad period sure, as just today he didn't have the best 2nd period but overall it's so damn impressive how well he plays overall.

You really got to love what the Habs have done with their prospect pool. Out of Caufield, Suzuki, Brook, Primeau, Romanov, Poehling, any one of them could be our top prospect and it wouldn't surprise me out of any of them whatever one ends up being the best of the bunch. Then you still have Ylonen, Struble, Harris, Fleury. When you have 10 really solid prospects, with many having high upside that at least gives you a good place to start to build a contender some day hopefully.

Ylonen belongs in the first group and could pretty much ends up as our best prospect as well...

 

[Adam Michaels]

He's listed for the NCAA in 2020-2021, not 2019-2020.

His draft year was meh. Legit players usually play most of their year in U20, not U18 and U18 Allvenskan.
Looking at the U20 in 2018-2019, the people in front of him are:
- 11 Undrafted 19-20 years old
- 1 2019 2nd rounder
- 1 2019 4th rounder
- 4 2020 probable 1st round picks

According to this, he committed for this upcoming season: Felix Carenfelt commits to Merrimack

"Felix Carenfelt, a 2000-born forward from Sweden, has committed to Merrimack for this upcoming season (2019)."

This is what I went with when I said he'll play at Merrimack this year. I think he's worth keeping an eye on as an undrafted. Or is he still eligible for next year's draft? I keep forgetting what is the cut off date for draft eligibility.

 

[Treb]

According to this, he committed for this upcoming season: Felix Carenfelt commits to Merrimack

"Felix Carenfelt, a 2000-born forward from Sweden, has committed to Merrimack for this upcoming season (2019)."

This is what I went with when I said he'll play at Merrimack this year. I think he's worth keeping an eye on as an undrafted. Or is he still eligible for next year's draft? I keep forgetting what is the cut off date for draft eligibility.

Since he's an euro, he's eligible for the next 3 years.

 

[canadiensnation]

actually got robbed the goalie got a glove on it.

 

[montreal]

Anyone know anything about Felix Carenfelt of Sweden? He went undrafted the last two drafts he was eligible. He will play at Merrimack in the NCAA this season.

He's 5'10" and 185 lbs. Is an LW. He is 19 years old.

Looking at his stats on Elite Prospects, he seems to produce pretty much every level he's played in.

Last season, he played for Djurgardens J20 and was a point-per-game player. He has 41 pts (19G, 22A) in 41 GP.

Felix Carenfelt at eliteprospects.com

he was chippy that's for sure, Romanov looked like he wanted blood after Carenfelt touched the goalie. Refs jumped in before they could drop the gloves, if they were intending to, both had their gloves in each others faces yesterday.

 

[montreal]

Finally got around to watching the 3rd game vs Finland. Not the best showing for Romanov, easily his worst of the 3 games, not that he was bad but just not as noticeable. Granted if he just fired that puck on the pass from Podkolzin I think it would have went in as long as he didn't flub it. He took a second before firing it and the goalie was able to get over enough to get his glove on it. Too bad as he had so much open net and it would have tied the game 3-3 late in the 3rd.

He may not have been 100% and likely wasn't as he took a slap shot somewhere, I couldn't tell where it hit him, maybe his right hip. He went down like he was shot and stayed on the ice for a few seconds. He looked to be in a good bit of pain on the bench but didn't miss a shift.

He was on the ice for Russia's 1st goal but wasn't involved in the play and he was on the ice for Finland's 1st goal but it wasn't his fault, the goalie went behind the net and as Romanov came skating around behind the net the goalie tried to fire it past him and instead turned it over and wasn't able to get set in net. You could see Romanov taking to him after the goal and raising his hand as if to say WTF were you doing. Or not. But clearly on the goalie as I assume Romanov expected him to leave the puck as he was coming in at full speed knowing he had a Finnish player on his tail.

 

[canadiensnation]

Breaking down some tape of Romanov from this tournament.
Alexander Romanov at the 4 Nations U20 Tournament

 

[QuebecPride]

That's what you get when your player development coach is Francis Bouillon. King of ruining cycles with an unscreened wrister.

Bof, it's not something that's not hard to fix. No need to blast Bouillon because a prospect takes a shot in a 2v1 on a clear break.

 

[Favster]

Breaking down some tape of Romanov from this tournament.
Alexander Romanov at the 4 Nations U20 Tournament

He looks ridiculously strong on his skates and the puck. Can't wait for him to come over.