Matias Vanhanen Deep Dive: The Devils Prospect Could Climb Rankings Fast
Matias Vanhanen was passed over in the 2025 NHL Draft. A year later the New Jersey Devils took him 37th overall. It’s the gap that tells the whole story.
He did not become a different player overnight. He went to the WHL with the Everett Silvertips, put the puck on teammates’ tape 66 times in 62 games, and forced every team that skipped him following his U20 years in Finland to look again. That is why he ranks No. 6 in our 2026 Devils Prospect Rankings. The criteria still start with skating, puck skills, hockey sense, compete, and defensive detail. Then production, trajectory, and NHL projection.
Vanhanen’s vision is the best in this group after the names already above him in our prospect rankins. Yet, said ranking is a bet that the playmaking holds when the ice gets smaller.
How he got here
Born September 11, 2007 in Nokia, Finland. Left shot. About 5-foot-11, 176 pounds. He came through Tappara’s U16 group, then HIFK. In 2024-25 he won HIFK U20’s scoring title with 47 points in 42 games, got a five-game Liiga look, and played for Finland at the U18 Worlds. Nobody called his name at the draft.
Vanahan used that. Everett took him in the CHL Import Draft. Last season he set the Silvertips’ rookie scoring record: 21 goals, 66 assists, 87 points, plus-58. Second in the WHL in assists. Twenty-four more points in 18 playoff games. Six assists in seven games at the World Juniors. Then he committed to Boston College — the first WHL player the Eagles have ever recruited.
Unsigned. Soon 19. The next step is college.
What the game looks like
Vanhanen sees the ice a beat early. That is his gift. He finds the trailer, the backdoor, the weak-side winger who has not even called for it yet. It allows him to produce give-and-gos, soft saucer passes, and place pucks through layers that most juniors do not attempt. Teammates in Everett talked about passes they did not know were available until the puck was already there.
The skating is good enough. He is shifty more than he is a burner. He creates time by changing pace and using the extra half-second his brain buys him. The puck skills are real as he can handle in tight and make the first play under pressure.
The shot is the drawback. Scouts said it all year and the eye test proves it. Vanahan can score — netting 21 goals in the regular season & 12 more in the playoffs — but a lot of that came from being in the right place, not from a release that beats NHL goalies from the circle. If that shot does not come, he needs linemates who finish. Perhaps, that is a playmaker’s life. Yet, it is also a risk, and perhaps what saw him fall to the second round last June.
Compete is quiet. Six penalty minutes in 62 games. He is not running anyone. He does go to the net, which helps, and the plus-58 was not an accident on a good Everett team. Defensive detail is still the junior version. He can get caught watching the play he wants to make.
College will punish that faster than the WHL did, but this should be good for his development.
Why he is sixth
Alexander Command has the two-way center profile and the higher floor. Lenni Hämeenaho has already played in the NHL. Seamus Casey has already produced there, too. Vanhanen has the cleanest offensive brain of the younger forwards and a season that looks like a steal if the translation works.
He also has runway. Soon 19 years old, heading to Boston College, no entry-level deal burning years. A strong freshman season moves him up this list in a hurry. A quiet one leaves him as a skilled college playmaker with a light shot. That swing is why the title fits.
NHL Projection
The realistic NHL outcome is a middle-six playmaker. A wing who makes the centers around him better and chips in enough goals to stay in the lineup. The high end is a first-unit power-play passer who can run an offense from the flank. The low end is a player whose vision never gets enough time and space against men.
Comparisons should stay in that lane. Think of the smaller European playmakers who needed college or the AHL to add strength and a shot. Not Jack Hughes. Vanhanen has said he looked up to Hughes. The admiration is fine, but the projection should not copy it.
Instead, he’s more like Teuvo Teräväinen.
What this season has to look like
After committing to Boston College following a year in the WHL, the NCAA is the test:
Watch three things at BC:
- Does the assist rate survive a stronger, older league?
- Does he shoot enough that defenses cannot sit on the pass?
- Can he play a responsible enough game to stay on the ice in the second half of close games?
If those answers are yes, he climbs. The Devils can afford to wait. That is the point of leaving him in college.
Verdict
Vanhanen will not help the Devils soon. He should play a full season at Boston College, take power-play time, and show that last year’s WHL explosion was the start of something rather than a good year on a loaded line.
He is No. 6 because the playmaking is too good to park lower, and because the path in front of him is the kind that can move a ranking fast. Missed in 2025. Taken in the 30s in 2026. The next jump is on him, and it wouldn’t surprise us if he makes the most drastic leap of any Devils prospect in the upcoming season.