Photo by Eric Young, CHL
The first-ever CHL USA Prospects Challenge is now finished, and if you just glanced at the stats, you may not think it was worth it.
The CHL won both games in London and Oshawa with a combined score of 9-3 over the USA Hockey National Team Development Program. The shots were even more lopsided, and in Oshawa, the game would have been much worse than 3-2 had NTDP goaltender Harrison Boettiger not put in a Herculean effort while his team was outshot 38-12.
So was it worth it? Definitely.
On paper, this year’s contests heavily favored the CHL, which had 15 A-rated skaters from Central Scouting’s list for the 2025 NHL draft, versus two on the NTDP.
The U.S. kids were also missing some of their best draft-eligible players – late 2006 birthdays already in college, such as James Hagens, Logan Hensler and Shane Vansaghi. Having said that, it was a great opportunity to see the NTDP kids play against the most elite competition in their age group.
For me, forwards such as Jack Murtagh and William Belle were the best NTDP skaters in Oshawa, giving all they had against the likes of potential top five picks, such as Porter Martone, Michael Misa and Matthew Schaefer. And for the NTDP, this was just another test for their kids as ‘The Program’ tries to prepare them for college, the pros and hopefully, the NHL one day.
“We purposely put our players in really challenging environments to develop experience and growth,” said NTDP coach Greg Moore. “We’re playing college teams with players who are 22, 23, sometimes 25-year-old men. It builds character and resiliency, and in these two games, they never quit or gave up.”
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After getting swamped 6-1 in London, the NTDP refocused in Oshawa. While the CHL dominated offensive zone time, the American squad blocked a ton of shots, got sticks in lanes and battled hard in front of their MVP goalie Boettiger.
“It was exactly what you’d expect,” Moore said. “There’s a ton of talent over there, some really good players. They were really competitive and there was a lot of pride on both sides. It got very heated, and I thought both teams stood their ground.”
Indeed, there were a lot of extra-curriculars as the game went on, including a couple of 5-on-5 scrums that were as close to fights as you can get when the NTDP kids were wearing their customary full cages/bubbles on their helmets.
“It was a bit of a weird game with them in cages and us in visors,” said Caleb Desnoyers, the CHL’s player of the game in Oshawa. “But at the end of the day, we managed to be pretty hard on them and more physical.”
And despite being on the losing end, the NTDP kids had a lot of fun – and certainly didn’t mind the rough stuff.
“It’s a big rivalry game and everyone is super-competitive,” said center Cole McKinney. “In those moments, everyone wants an edge and everyone’s fired up. It’s a really fun environment to play in.”
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The event also got full marks from the CHL’s coach, Kris Mallette.
“I’d love for it to be a five-game series, to be honest,” he said. “Something early, then maybe something later on in the season, like a rivalry series.”
The CHL and NTDP have at least two more of these events planned for the coming years, and perhaps Mallette will get his expansion wish. He had already coached many of his CHL all-stars at the summer’s Hlinka-Gretzky tournament, and depending on CHL playoff results, some of these kids could be teammates again at the World Men’s Under-18s in Dallas. That’s where most of the kids from the NTDP will be, as that tournament is the culmination of their two years with ‘The Program.’ Getting to play against the best draft-eligibles in the CHL can only help them in their goal of winning gold as Team USA at the end of the year.
“We don’t like to lose – we’re not accepting or OK with it – but they know the challenges we put them through,” Moore said. “This experience will set us up, especially for April and the world under-18s, they’re going to be able to look back at this challenge and how they overcame some hurdles and had to find their game. All these experiences will help us big-time in the end.”
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