Forward Devils Prospects on the Bubble: Players Knocking on the Top 15 Door
The New Jersey Devils’ forward pipeline gets thin in a hurry after the top names.
Now, that is not an insult. It is the reason this group matters.
This group of forwards are sitting just outside our 2026 Devils Prospect Rankings. Not the kids already in the 15. The ones who can walk into it with one good season. Same criteria as the rest of the series: skating, puck skills, hockey sense, compete, defensive detail, then production, trajectory, and a job that actually exists in the NHL.
A bubble forward does not need to become a star. He needs to force a recount.
Lavr Gashilov
If one name on this list can jump the line, it is Lavr Gashilov.
The Devils took him 119th overall in June after moving back two spots in the second round and picking up the extra selection. He had just led a draft-eligible season in MHL assists: 16 goals and 53 assists for 69 points in 51 games with Avto Yekaterinburg. He also got cups of coffee in the VHL and KHL that did not produce a point and did not need to. The junior tape was the point.
He sees the ice. He hits seams other 18-year-olds do not try. The power-play work is a real piece of the game.
The problems are the ones that send skilled Russians into the fourth round. The skating that does not always keep up with the brain, and a defensive game that still looks optional. Gashilov is listed around 5-foot-11 and 185 pounds. The next step is men’s minutes in Yekaterinburg, not another year padding the MHL sheet.
He is a top-six bet or he is a miss. There is not much middle. That is why he sits first among the forwards knocking on the door.
Gustav Hillström
Gustav Hillström is the opposite kind of bubble player. Safer, and with less fireworks.
A fourth-round pick in 2025, Hillström is a 6-foot-2, right shot forward with two-way habits. He can own the U20 Nationell. He has not owned the SHL. Last year he bounced between Brynäs’ junior team, where he produced, and the men’s club, where the offense dried up. Pace against men was the issue. Hockey sense and faceoffs were not.
This season in Sweden is a big test. He’s no Alexander Command, but if he sticks in the SHL and starts showing up on the scoresheet, he slides past a couple of names in the 13–15 range. If he is back dominating juniors and disappearing against men, he stays what he is now, which is a responsible center prospect with a modest ceiling.
Mason Moe
Mason Moe looks like a bottom-six center before he looks like anything else. That is not a slight.
Third-round pick in 2025. 6-foot-2. Moe is a Minnesota kid who went home to the Gophers. He takes the body, protects the puck, gets to the net, and plays with a motor that coaches notice in November. The freshman year was fine, but not loud. He tallied double-digit points (12 points in 33 games) in a limited role that grew as the season went along.
He is years away. College centers with his build usually are. The question is whether the offense ever becomes more than complementary. If it does, he is a third-line piece. If it does not, he is still a useful extra who can play a heavy shift. Both outcomes keep him on the bubble. Neither gets him into the top 10 without a jump.
Josh Filmon
Josh Filmon has the size to play in the NHL. He has not had the consistency to stay in the AHL.
He’s a left wing standing at 6-foot-3 with occasional flash. In his first pro year, he split time between Utica and Adirondack. When the shot is going he looks like a depth scorer. When it is not, he looks like a roster bubble in the minors. That is a hard profile to rank. The tools are not empty. The results have not forced anyone to move him up.
He needs a full Utica season and a point total that does not require an explanation. Until then he is the example of a prospect who can play and has not yet proved he should.
Cole Brown & David Rozsíval
These two belong together because the timeline is the same. A bit longer, thinner, yet still worth tracking.
Cole Brown was a 2023 sixth-round pick. He is 6-foot-2, played Notre Dame, and still has the frame and the shot that got him drafted. The production has never been loud enough to push him into the 15. He is a development winger. One strong college year changes the sentence. A quiet one does not end it, but it keeps him here.
David Rozsíval went in the sixth round in 2025 and put together a real USHL year with Green Bay: 23 goals and 37 points in 57 games. He is headed to the University of St. Thomas. At 19, that is the right next step. The path is long. Sixth-round wingers from the USHL do not walk into the NHL. They earn a second look if the college offense shows up and the details travel.
Neither is knocking as hard as Gashilov. Both can still make noise if the next season is clean.
Who they are chasing
Ben Kevan, Cam Squires, and Matyas Melovsky hold 13 through 15. That is the door.
Kevan has the speed and the wider range of outcomes. Squires has the hockey sense and the average skating. Melovsky has the AHL sample and the call-up profile. A bubble forward does not have to out-skill all three. He has to out-produce the ones whose games stalled.
Gashilov can do that with a KHL year. Hillström can do it with an SHL year. Moe needs two college seasons. Filmon needs one clean AHL season. Brown and Rozsíval need time.
Verdict
This is not a hidden star class. It is a group of bets.
Gashilov is the swing. Hillström and Moe are the safer centers. Filmon is the pro who has to start producing like one. Brown and Rozsíval are the long shots who still have a season that can change the ranking.
The Devils’ top seven forwards and defensemen will get the headlines. These names decide whether the pipeline has a second wave or just a list of depth charts. One of them will be in the 15 the next time these rankings update. The rest will still be knocking.