Oilers Prospect Weekly Report: October 2, 2025
With the winding down of the NHL training camp, the Oilers have been returning prospects to their respective developmental teams. This begins the official start of my weekly series on prospects for the Oilers and who has been notable in the past seven days. The report will come out every Thursday morning right to your inbox. You can read it in your office, in meetings you aren’t paying attention to anyway or anytime you should be working, but don’t really want too. Without further adieu, here is your report for the week ending October 2, 2025.
Nikita Yevseyev
Yevseyev continues his fast start to the season. He has registered 1-4-5 in nine games this season. He also has 15 shots on net. How does this compare to last year? Yevseyev had 1-1-2 in 38 games with 12 shots on net. To say it has been a sea change is a massive understatement. Yevseyev is averaging 30 shifts a game and his time on ice is 22:03 per game. He is playing on the first pairing and is involved in all high leverage situations including the powerplay.
This week Yevseyev registered two assist in his two games. He also had two shots on net. This has been a surprise. What has not been a surprise is Yevseyev’s defensive game. He is a great skater with good size. He pairs those traits with angry intent.
Yevseyev just needs to keep his play at this level through the year. I don’t believe the scoring will keep up, but he’s such a tremendous defender that he will continue to play lots of minutes. This prospect has to be opening eyes in Edmonton.
Albin Sundin
Another player that saw a huge change when he was traded was Albin Sundin. Sundin played limited minutes with Frolunda last year and was ultimately sent down to the Allsvenskan. This season with his new team in Timra, Sundin is on the first pairing playing almost 20 minutes a night. Sundin doesn’t play a lot of powerplay, but that is the only exception to his ice-time. Sundin is 6’2” and 200 pounds. Given the fact he is a right shot, he is intriguing to me. He is also a very competent skater.
Sundin’s focus in terms of development will be two-fold: offence and retrievals. He only has one point in seven games, but he does show some understanding of the offensive game.
The retrieval part of his game is a little more wobbly. He is ok with space, but under pressure he tends to panic a bit. Now he is 21 years old, so there is time. However, in Sweden he plays on a bigger ice surface. So if he makes the jump to North America, he is even going to have less time and space.
David Lewandowski
Lewandowski was returned to his junior team in Saskatoon last week. He has returned to his natural position at left wing. In the two games, he has one goal and one assist. He also has added four shots. His telltale wrister was on display with his first goal of the season.
It’s early days for Lewandowski, but I expect a strong increase in his offensive totals this season with him fully adapted to North America this year.
Tommy Lafrieniere
Lafreniere has a similar story to Lewandowski. He was returned last week and has played two games. Lafrieniere has only registered one point, which was a nice powerplay goal.
Lafreniere has contributed 10 shots on net in those two games, so I expect the offence will develop shortly. He is also a tidy 66% in the face-off circle going 27 for 41. The key for Lafreniere this year is to continue to develop his offensive game. His skating and smarts should help him in this cause.
News and Notes
Maxim Beryozkin continues to struggle in the KHL. His ice-time is still strong as is his shot totals. Right now though he is very snake bitten with 3 points in 11 games. He seems more focused on his defensive game at the moment and that looks to be contributing to his scoring woes. This is just a yellow flag alert at the moment. More of something to monitor for now.
After a quick start, Daniel Salonen has struggled with a .847 save percentage and a 3.25 goals against average. His Finnish countryman, Eemil Vinni played one game this week and stopped 20 of 21 in a 2-1 win. Both are very young men with lots of road ahead of them.
That’s it for this week’s Edmonton Oilers prospect report. As always, leave your messages here. If you think someone would enjoy this post, please share. Have a great week everyone.
Good stuff. Is it possible to do articles and critiques of all Bako players and not just prospects?? I ask because my definition is way different than anyone else. I view a prospect not by age but by NHL games played. For example several of the euro players are older but have not played 1 in season NHL game. Also how you view some of the AHL contracts in Bako. Are they improving and may one day earn and ELC???