With another World Junior Championship in the books, let’s take a look at how the Utah Hockey Club’s five participating prospects fared. For an overview of the World Juniors, check out this recent Deseret News article.
Team USA, the only team with more than four NHL-drafted players that didn’t have a Utah HC prospect, captured the gold medal in an overtime battle with Team Finland.
Veeti Väisänen, Finland
Veeti Väisänen was Utah’s only prospect in the gold medal game. He and Team Finland fell in overtime to Team USA, but it was a hard-fought battle and he’ll still go home with a silver medal.
Väisänen played a key defensive role for Finland. He was among its top penalty killers and was always trusted in key defensive situations. He notched one assist in his seven games. Väisänen won’t likely be a Mikhail Sergachev-esque two-way defenseman in the NHL, but he sure has a shot at being a reliable shutdown player.
He did make one controversial move, throwing his helmet out of frustration and, albeit accidentally, hitting the linesman. He was fortunate that the officials recognized it as an accident; there can be serious repercussions for striking officials.
Michael Hrabal, Czechia
Utah HC would love to see Michael Hrabal develop into a top NHL goaltender, and he showed throughout this tournament that he has the potential to do so. He finished the tournament with a .919 save percentage and a 2.45 goals-against average.
He led his team to a bronze medal, which came via the longest shootout in IIHF history: 54 shooters.
Hrabal’s numbers in the NCAA have improved this year as well. Goalies typically take much longer to develop than anyone else, so don’t be surprised if he doesn’t make the NHL for another few years — but the 6-foot-6 Czech seems to be well on his way.
Each World Juniors team names its three top players upon elimination or advancement to the medal rounds. Hrabal was one of Czechia’s three.
Vojtěch Hradec, Czechia
Vojtěch Hradec, whom Utah HC drafted in the sixth round this summer, ended up tied as the tournament’s eighth-highest scorer and, like Hrabal, was honored as one of Czechia’s three best players in the tournament. He led all Czech forwards in ice time during the tournament.
Though it’s not the color he wanted, Hradec will fly home with a bronze medal around his neck.
The cutoff date to be eligible for the NHL draft is Sept. 15. If you haven’t turned 18 by then, you must wait until the following draft. Hradec’s birthday is Sept. 24, making him one of the oldest first-year-eligible players in his class.
He didn’t get many chances to prove himself in Czechia’s Extraliga last season. It and other European leagues have rules that mandate that a certain number of players born before a given year must be on each team’s roster, but it does not require them to play. The rules are intended to persuade young players to stay in their home countries, but they often end up playing the “left bench” position.
Hradec proved throughout this tournament that when he’s placed in the right role, he can be quite a player. As for the Utah Hockey Club, it may have found a diamond in the rough.
Melker Thelin, Sweden
Melker Thelin, whom Arizona selected in the fifth round of the 2023 draft, played all but two games for Team Sweden. He registered a 2.91 goals-against average and a .885 save percentage en route to a fourth-place finish. He started the tournament as Sweden’s starter, but Marcus Gidlöf stole the net from him in the bronze medal game.
A 2.91 goals-against is pretty good, but a .885 save percentage is not great. His teammates did a good job at suppressing shooters, to the point that he faced just 13 shots in one game and 17 in another.
Cole Beaudoin, Canada
In a rather surprising turn of events, Beaudoin was the first Utah HC prospect to be eliminated from the tournament (Team Canada is almost always in the running for gold).
Canada fell to Hrabal, Hradec and Czechia in the quarterfinal — and it’s the second year in a row doing so.
Beaudoin was the subject of much controversy in the game, receiving a five-minute major penalty and a game misconduct for kneeing midway through the first period. Canadian fans tended to think it was an unnecessarily strict punishment, but the referees reviewed it and deemed that it was the correct call.
He finished the tournament with a single assist in five games, having primarily played a defensive role for a highly talented Canadian squad. He told the Deseret News in mid-November that he wanted to be trusted in every kind of situation, and that’s exactly what he did for Team Canada.
“That’s always been a big aspect of my game, is being able to be put out in those last two minutes, or being able to be put out in any kind of draw scenario,” he said. “So I think that’s something that I’m going to continue to work on.”