How many playoff teams in the NHL have half a dozen prospects who could push for roster spots next season?
It’s probably just one: the Utah Mammoth.
That’s the result of a long rebuild, which began well before the group moved to Utah. GM Bill Armstrong and his staff executed trade after trade to accrue draft picks in the early part of the decade, and those picks have now blossomed into several prominent NHL players and a cupboard overflowing with prospects.
While Armstrong did not yet have an answer in his Tuesday exit interview regarding the specific needs he’d like to fill over the offseason, he did speak on how up-and-coming prospects could satisfy some of those needs.
“We want to encourage our prospects to come in and try and make our club,” he said. “You never want to take a dream away from a prospect — and you don’t know. Sometimes, they can just show up and they earn their way in.
“We want to make sure that our prospects, that are probably seeing this press conference, come up, come ready. Be fighting for a job. There’s opportunity there.”
That said, Armstrong isn’t going to gift a job to anyone. If a prospect makes the team out of training camp, it will be because he earned a spot.
“They’ve got to come in and they’ve got to take somebody’s job,” Armstrong said. “Let’s be clear about that. They’ve got to show up in the best shape and they’ve got to earn the right to take that job. So, it’s going to be competitive — and I like that.”
Current Mammoth forward Liam O’Brien was once in that boat.
After going undrafted, the Washington Capitals invited the then-20-year-old to their 2014 development camp. He impressed enough to get a training camp invitation, followed by an NHL contract.
O’Brien would split the next few seasons between the NHL and the AHL with the Capitals, the Colorado Avalanche and the two teams’ respective minor-league affiliates before landing a permanent NHL job with the Arizona Coyotes.
While it’s not often that someone in O’Brien’s situation has the skillset to beat out an NHL veteran for a job, it’s entirely possible that one of the six first-round picks in Utah’s system does. The team also has a number of other highly rated prospects who could realistically push for roster spots.
“Instead of Coach out there whipping them, they just look across the bench and they’re like, ‘Oh, wow. That guy’s pretty good. I’m not losing my job,’” Armstrong said.
Here are a few prospects who could realistically challenge for a roster spot as early as the coming season.
For the sake of conciseness, we’ll exclude those who played NHL games this season: Dmitri Simashev, Daniil But and Maveric Lamoureux — but they could all realistically make the roster out of camp.
Tij Iginla
- Position: center/left wing
- Age: 19
- Height: 6-foot-0
- Weight: 182 pounds
- 2025-26 team: Kelowna Rockets, WHL
- 2025-26 production: 48 games played, 41 goals, 90 points
With the sixth-overall pick in the 2024 draft, Utah selected Tij Iginla, making him the first selection in franchise history.
His last name is a big one in the hockey world. Tij’s father, Jarome Iginla, is tied for 17th in all-time NHL goals, earning him a first-ballot Hall of Fame election. But Tij Iginla is vying to be known as an elite hockey player himself.
He’s well on his way.
After recovering from double hip surgery, Iginla went on to score a little less than two points per game in the WHL this season.
Iginla’s Kelowna Rockets are hosting the Memorial Cup, where he could end up facing up to three fellow Mammoth prospects, two of whom are listed below as other top candidates to make the Mammoth out of training camp.
Caleb Desnoyers
- Position: center
- Age: 19
- Height: 6-foot-2
- Weight: 178 pounds
- 2025-26 team: Moncton Wildcats, QMJHL
- 2025-26 production: 45 games played, 22 goals, 78 points
Caleb Desnoyers missed some time due to injury this season, but that didn’t stop him from making a massive impact as the captain of the Moncton Wildcats.
The 2025 fourth-overall pick is heralded as an elite two-way player. He compares himself to Jonathan Toews, who captained the Chicago Blackhawks to their three Stanley Cup championships in the 2010s.
Desnoyers is one of the most confident young men you’ll ever meet, which is part of what made the Mammoth’s scouting staff fall in love with him as a hockey player.
Cole Beaudoin
- Position: center
- Age: 20
- Height: 6-foot-2
- Weight: 209 pounds
- 2025-26 team: Barrie Colts, OHL
- 2025-26 production: 54 games played, 33 goals, 88 points
Fans might remember when Utah traded up to acquire an extra first-round pick in the 2024 draft. The scouts felt so strongly about Cole Beaudoin, they had to make sure they got him.
Two seasons later, it’s clear why.
The power forward is one of the fittest prospects out there. His offensive production is impressive and his defensive responsibility is top-tier. He’s a leader and a workhorse.
Beaudoin impressed the coaches in his first training camp, to the point that they kept him in the top group when he was scheduled to go back down. His second training camp wasn’t as impressive, so he will need to get back to it in his third one.
Barrie Colts head coach Dylan Smoskowitz raved about one of his co-captains on “TSN Overdrive” Tuesday.
“If you’re a Utah Mammoth fan, man, you’ve got a hockey player coming your way,” he said. “Like, you want to talk about a 200-foot, culture guy, leader, this guy’s 12% body fat, 205 pounds — hockey player.”
Beaudoin took home the William Hanley Trophy this year as the OHL’s most sportsmanlike player. He also had first-place finishes in four areas of the coaches’ poll:
- Hardest worker
- Best defensive forward
- Best on face-offs
- Best penalty killer
Maksymilian Szuber
- Position: defense
- Age: 23
- Height: 6-foot-3
- Weight: 215 pounds
- 2025-26 team: Tucson Roadrunners, AHL
- 2025-26 production: 65 games played, 11 goals, 27 points
As a sixth-round pick, Maksymilian Szuber has had to earn every chance he’s ever gotten.
Talking to those who follow the Tucson Roadrunners closely, everyone is high on this guy. He’s big, he’s good on both sides of the puck, and he’s nothing but respectful off the ice.
Utah has a surplus of defense prospects, so Szuber has lots of competition, but he has the tools to make it.
Michael Hrabal
- Position: goalie
- Age: 21
- Height: 6-foot-6
- Weight: 209 pounds
- 2025-26 team: UMass, NCAA
- 2025-26 production: 29 games played, .937 save percentage, 1.95 goals-against average
Goalie development is unpredictable at best, but based on how his college hockey career went, Michael Hrabal seems to be Utah’s goalie of the future.
The 6-foot-6 tower was a finalist for the Mike Richter Award this season, given to the top goalie in the NCAA. His stats were off the charts.
Hrabal played three AHL games at the end of the season, putting up respectable-but-not-formidable numbers. Most goalies take several AHL seasons before becoming full-time NHL goalies, so don’t be surprised if that’s where he plays the bulk of his hockey next season.
Owen Allard
- Position: center
- Age: 22
- Height: 6-foot-2
- Weight: 190 pounds
- 2025-26 team: Tucson Roadrunners, AHL
- 2025-26 production: 69 games played, 8 goals, 19 points
Think of Owen Allard as a Brandon Tanev type of player. He’s not going to fill the net on a nightly basis, but he will play responsible, hard, fast hockey.
That’s the type of player teams need in the playoffs.
He has crossed many speed bumps on his path to pro hockey, but nothing has stopped him yet.
“We’ve got some young players that can play,” Armstrong said. “It’s going to be a heck of a training camp.”