The Toronto Maple Leafs organization has drafted and developed a number of youngsters currently playing in the NHL like Auston Matthews, Mitch Marner, William Nylander, Pierre Engvall, Travis Dermott and Justin Holl, but the next step for the club under GM Kyle Dubas is to keep replenishing the prospect pool to provide the Leafs with youngsters who can step up and replace veterans who retire, depart via free agency or are traded.
As we did last year, we will rank the club’s top prospects over the next few weeks based on their progress in either the NCAA, CHL, Europe, ECHL or AHL and their potential to make the Leafs roster and make a contribution in the future.
Players are eligible for the list if they have not played more than 40 NHL games:
#40 - Jeremy McKenna – RW (Wichita – ECHL, Toronto – AHL)
#39 – Ryan Tverberg – C (Connecticut – NCAA)
#38 – Ryan O’Connell – D (Ohio State – NCAA)
#37 - Semyon Kizimov – RW (Lada Togliatti – VHL / Torpedo – KHL)
#36 - Wyatt Schingoethe – C (Waterloo – USHL)
#35 - Kalle Loponen – D (Karpat – Finland SM-Liiga)
#34 - Vladislav Kara – LW (Cherepovets Severstal/Moscow Spartak – KHL)
#33 - Kirill Semyonov – C (Avangard Omsk – KHL)
#32 - William Villeneuve – D (Saint John – QMJHL)
#31 - Ty Voit – LW (Sarnia – OHL)M
The Maple Leafs had only three picks in the 2021 NHL Draft after making deals for rentals Nick Foligno, David Rittich and Ben Hutton. In the fifth round, Toronto followed their usual modus operandi during the Kyle Dubas administration of opting for players with high skill first and foremost, selecting Sarnia Sting forward Ty Voit 153rd overall.
Voit is another US product (from the Pittsburgh area), who had an excellent rookie season as a 16-year-old (8 goals, 20 assists in 49 games) with the Sting, but did not play in 2021 because of the OHL shutdown.
Elite Prospects says Voit “is full of creative, unexpected offensive patterns; he attracts defensive pressure and makes plays through layers. He doesn’t overhandle the puck, opting for give-and-goes and early passes after gaining the zone.”
The 5’9” 150 lb. winger is speedy with an excellent skating stride and high agility according to the HP Black Book.
"His great edge work combined with good vision and spatial awareness allows him to maneuver around defensemen and generate scoring plays. Although Voit is undersized, his skating helps mitigates that concern, as he had no problem generating offence against bigger opponents."
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