23 of the top NCAA free agents for the 2022-23 season
Post by Admin on Tuesday, Jan 03, 2023
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This year’s crop of NCAA free agents presents a lot of hard-working forwards, some extremely gifted shooters, and some defencemen who have NHL potential. It’s a big year for teams to add seasoned prospects to their pools and try to get their hands on free talent without spending a draft pick.
The signing period will begin when teams wrap up their NCAA seasons. We have the national championship game scheduled for April 8th but teams will be eliminated in the weeks prior to the final game of the NCAA year.
From late March to early April, we will see a lot of college free agents sign with NHL teams and could be in AHL or NHL lineups within days of signing pro contracts.
Here’s a look at our top free-agent candidates from the 2022-23 NCAA season.
We didn’t rank these players or put them in order of our top free agents, but we have to start with the cream of the crop in right-shot defenceman Jake Livingstone.
Livingstone has the size and puck-moving ability that will make him successful at the next level. It wouldn’t come as a surprise to see him in the NHL as soon as his college season concludes. Many believed he would have been one of the top free agents if he left college after last season but the BC-born defenceman decided to go back to school for his junior year. Livingstone can quarterback a power play, kill penalties and also has the trait to be a stay-at-home defender at even strength.
He has a strong shot from the point, does a great job at making quick decisions during puck retrievals in his own end, and plays physically around his crease and in the corners. There’s plenty to like about Livingstone, but he is still a work in progress.
To have success at the NHL level, Livingstone will need to improve his skating. He has a level of skating that doesn’t worry you about AHL success but to really reach his full potential, an NHL organization needs to believe in their skating coach and put in the work with this kid. He has the potential to be a bottom-four defenceman in the NHL. It would come as a surprise if he ever ends up being a top-pairing guy, but as a 6’3″ right-shot defenceman, it would be far more surprising if there’s an NHL team that isn’t interested in Livingstone.
He will have his pick of the litter when it comes to which NHL team he wants to sign with and immediately helps with organizational depth on the right side of the defence.
After passing through the NHL draft as a 19-year-old, Hunter McKown has come out this season with a vengeance. He matched his goal totals from last season before Christmas and has been a huge piece of Colorado’s offence.
The right-shot sniper has size but does lack foot speed — which is likely why he was passed by in the NHL draft. His scoring during his junior season has put him on NHL teams’ radars. At 20 years old, there’s still a lot that an NHL organization can do about improving his pace.
A seventh-round pick of the Colorado Avalanche in 2017, Nick Leivermann is a sub-six-foot defenceman who defends space with some of the best in the NCAA. His skating is at a high level and his offence has continued to improve throughout his NCAA career. Leivermann has strong puck-handling ability and the best part about his puck-handling is how he is able to make little movements with the puck on his stick before releasing a shot. He does this to find holes through traffic and has a lot of power behind his wrist shot.
At 5’11”, he is not undersized and his shot is elite when it comes to NCAA free agent defenceman in this year’s class. He should have an immediate impact in the AHL and potentially could be a third-pairing defenceman for an NHL team if he is able to transition his best skills to pro hockey.
Leivermann is in his fifth season with Notre Dame and is captaining the Fighting Irish.
Born in Vancouver, Nick Poisson played his minor hockey at the Burnaby Winter Club before swimming up province for two seasons of BCHL play in Price George with the Spruce Kings.
Poisson plays a smart game, consistently finding himself in open pockets in the offensive zone. When we refer to him as a smart player, we also need to mention that he knows where the best scoring chances come from — the front of the net. Poisson plays without fear when it comes to battling for pucks around the crease and though he could use some work in the defensive zone when it comes to his ability to force turnovers, for the most part, he is positionally sound as a centre on the defensive side.
On a Providence College team with nine drafted position players, Poisson has cemented himself as the second-line centre, but may opt for another year of NCAA hockey before going pro.
He is only in his first NCAA season, but Ryan McAllister has been excellent in his first year of college hockey. The kid is leading the nation in points and attended the Toronto Maple Leafs development camp this past summer.
McAllister has shown to be one of the best playmakers in the NCAA and skates with a ton of pace. He has a very good-looking stride that is powerful and low to the ice. McAllister exploded in his final AJHL season, posting 139 points in 60 games with the Brooks Bandits. Any questions about how his game would translate to the NCAA have been answered, as he is dominating in his freshman year.
We may be looking at a rare one-and-done college hockey player here and NHL teams will be lining up to get a go at this potential free agent.
A tough defenceman with above-average skills in every area of the ice, Akito Hirose may not shine on the scoresheet but he has the skating and puck-control skills that you will need to see from an NCAA defenceman to view them as a future pro.
He is in his junior season with Minnesota Mankato and with how that program runs, it’s likely that he returns for his senior year. If he is to go pro after his junior year, there should be interest to get him right into the AHL and let him work his way up the depth chart to hopefully one day make it to the NHL.
With 6’4″ size and a very quick release, there’s some excitement growing about Jaxon Nelson in his senior season. The 22-year-old is one of the leaders on a mature Minnesota Gophers team that is packed full of high-end talent.
He thrives on the power play as one of the best net-front presences in the NCAA.
Nelson controls the slot in the offensive zone and is hard to move out of the crease when he plants his big frame around an opposing goaltender.
Though his size is the first thing you notice, his shot is not far behind. He’s very quick with wrist shots and seems to have a strong and accurate slap shot when he finds enough space to get it off.
You’d like to see him gain a step before he goes pro but with his size and raw shooting talent, teams will be interested in signing the Minneosta-born Nelson.
Coming off a 2021-22 season where he finished third in the nation for assists with 31, Brendan Furry returned to Minnesota State Mankato as the captain and should see interest from NHL teams this spring.
He’s a big and strong centre who plays a tough two-way game and has been a rock for Minnesota State in his time with the Mavericks. Furry has the work rate with the combination of skills to potentially be a bottom-six player in the NHL one day. It’s likely that Furry is already at a level where he would be an impact player in an AHL lineup. He should gain a lot of interest this spring, even as he is going through a down season when it comes to offensive production.
A feisty winger who has been finding the back of the net with the best of them this season. Jack Randl has had an interesting path to his senior year at the University of Nebraska-Omaha. He played the 2018-19 season with Michigan, before returning to the USHL for the 2019-20 season. He then moved to UNO and has been there for the past three seasons.
The 22-year-old winger has great lateral movement and uses a strong side-jump-step to get around defenders. He is aggressive with his skating technique and even more aggressive around the opposition’s crease. His shot is above average but he is scoring a lot of his goals from just being the first to loose pucks in the high-danger areas.
Nick Blankenburg walked so that Zach Metsa could run.
Blankenburg was looked at as one of the most offensively-gifted right-shot defencemen in the 2022 NCAA free agent class. His 5’9″ body limited teams showing interest in him and that was good for the Columbus Blue Jackets, who signed Blankenburg last season and have gotten two goals from him over seven games this season.
The reason we mention Blankenberg is that Metsa is a direct comparison to the Blue Jackets’ defenceman. At last year’s NCAA free agent signing period, many believed that Metsa was an even more exciting prospect as he put up more points and did it on a worse team.
Metsa is short but strong. He moves the puck extremely well from his own zone and has the skating ability to quickly reset breakouts in his own zone if the exit doesn’t play out correctly for his Quinnipiac squad. Metsa is the captain in his fifth season with Quinnipiac and though he is an aggressive defender, he rarely finds himself in the penalty box. His best trait is his ability to breakout pucks and his passes already look like they are at an NHL level. You can just see the pop on his sticks that reminds you of an NHLer.
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