We welcome Draftin Europe Director of European Scouting, Mik Portoni to the show. Mik walks us through some of the main talking points pertaining to our recently released Top 70 European Skaters list.

The Draftin Europe list is designed to be directly comparable to the European Skaters list published by NHL Central Scouting. Not only does Mik rank the players, he also compares the CS ranking, projects what round players may be taken in, and lists which round Draftin Europe values each of them, as well.

In this episode, Mik spends considerable time discussing Ivan Ryabin’s perplexing season, and explains why we still see the talented Russian as a Top 5 talent in the overall draft. He goes into great depth breaking down Anton Frondell’s game, before discussing fellow sure-fire pick William Eklund.

Alexander Zharovsky’s remarkable season is explained and Kurban Limatov is profiled. We consider where Radim Mrtka would have fit in, and then work our way through the Top 10, pausing to talk about Daniil Prokhorov in particular.

Also featured in this episode are overager Tomas Galvas, Kiril Yemelyanov, Nikita Tyurin, Elias Schneider, Vojtech Cihar, and Viggo Nordlund.

We joke about the past, discussing Kirill Kaprizov’s disastrous U18s, Nico Hischier and Petey’s infamous draft year, and why Mo Seider may be the most impressive Draftin Europe prediction to date.

Mik tells us what he thinks is needed to break the Florida Panther’s forecheck, and I compare this draft to 2021 and 2023, using strenuous links pertaining to Eklunds in the top 10 with comparable countrymen, and controversial Russians being overtaken by power forward Swedish types.

Draftin Europe’s Top 70 can be found here, free of charge: www.draftineu.net/2025/06/2025-draft-final-rankings/

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