Prospect Weekly: Signs of Life

The 2020-21 prospect season is slowly coming together with some speed bumps along the way. Many have been back in action over the last few weeks and have something to show for their preparations.

Martin Kaut scored the winning goal in overtime for a 3-2 victory over Plzen which has been their only win in four games. Unfortunately the following week Pardubice began a quarantine and will not play again until the 18th of October. Kaut has looked a step faster and using the bigger ice to his advantage as seen on his goal below.

Speaking of quarantine, in the KHL Lokomotiv entered a brief pause for about a week but they are now back in action. There was an even longer hiatus for Nikolai Kovalenko who finally suited up in Lokomotiv’s game over the weekend. Though he did not get any points Kovalenko put up three shots on goal.

Another returnee in the KHL was Danill Zhuravlyov who entered his first contest of the regular season on Monday for Ak Bars Kazan after suffering what was reported as a broken arm in preseason. He played just under 13 minutes in the game and produced a shot on goal.

Elsewhere in Europe the season has not started yet for top goaltending hope Justus Annunen although he is rumored to be close to a return. Karpat has already played two regular season games without him however. Annunen also completed his Finnish military requirement over the break.

Adam Werner has yet to start a regular season game in Sweden for Vita Hasten in the Allsvenskan but had one ugly preseason outing where he gave up eight goals. There will be ample time to get ready for the AHL season whenever that begins likely some time after the new year.

And to complete an update on the trio of goaltenders on the ice, Shamil Shmakov played in his first game in nearly a year when he started for Toros Neftekasmsk over the weekend. In their eighth game of the VHL season Shmakov gave up four goals and put up a .862 save percentage so clearly there’s some rust to work out. However on Monday he was in net again and only gave up two goals in a 6-2 win over SKA Neva.

Over in North America, Matt Stienburg has joined West Kelowna in the BCHL who are currently playing a 12 game preseason tournament with three other local teams called the Okanagan Cup. Stienburg suited up and has played one game thus far in a top six center role. His brand of physicality makes him an imposing player at that level while getting scoring chances but he hasn’t found the finishing touch just yet.

Alex Beaucage started his season as well with Rouyn-Noranda as the QMJHL got things rolling before their other CHL counterparts. It didn’t take long for Beaucage to get on the board as he scored his first goal of the season on the power play in his first contest as seen below on a sweet one timer and then also added an assist. Then in the next day he added two more goals and an assist on the overtime winning goal.