WJC: 2025 Team Latvia Roster Talk
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Eye of Ra
Grandmaster General of the International boards
The Latvian Locomotive ain't stopping, baby.
I don't want to derail (pun intended) the WJC thread with U18 talk too much, but we are facing Slovakia, Norway and Finland in our group, so a top 2 finish is realistic and 3rd place is likely. If we're lucky, that means facing Czechia or even Switzerland in the quarters.
kudla
Registered User
Yeah, I am not sure if facing Czechia is "lucky" for either Latvia or Slovakia. The way groups are shaped, I am afraid it is over. Good thing is that Latvia will at least get to play opponents on their level and actually prove that they can be better than them and get some points.
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Could you elaborate on that? I see two 2025 draft eligible players and three players for 2026 on EP draft center. None of them are marked as top prospects. Not that it's something different from previous years.
Yeah, it's going to be an exciting round robin. Obviously, the QF matchups can go either way, you can get lucky or unlucky, but the point remains - they can make the semis.
Yeah, kind of a slump year for us. After 2004 graduated, 2005 has little to offer to replace Locmelis, Vilmanis and Fenenko.
Bulans will be a fine 1st D, but he is worse than Fenenko is almost every aspect;
Mateiko is a good scorer, but he wont conduct the offence.
Other guys starting with Uljanskis and Osmanis are signifficantly younger. I hope we dont get demoted this year, because we sure as hell not getting demoted in the next ones, and it will be a shame if a weak 2005 class will cost our future guys an entire year.
Bulans will be a fine 1st D, but he is worse than Fenenko is almost every aspect;
Mateiko is a good scorer, but he wont conduct the offence.
Other guys starting with Uljanskis and Osmanis are signifficantly younger. I hope we dont get demoted this year, because we sure as hell not getting demoted in the next ones, and it will be a shame if a weak 2005 class will cost our future guys an entire year.
Whats wrong with having just three players listed for 2026? Czechia has 4, Slovakia has 4, Finland has 3 Switzerland has 2. Even USA has just 9. Only ten players are marked as "top prospect".
Being listed 2 years prior to the draft indicates notable talent. Those aren't just 3 potential draft picks. Those are 3 potential top two round picks.
There's nothing wrong with it but nothing new either. I doubt it's the first time Latvian players are listed on EP's prospect list two year prior to the draft. But I might have missed some other extremely talented Latvian generations recent years so I'm just curious.
Sure. I love how you view a list of 2026 prospects combined by eliteprospects as an actual reflection of reality.
2025:
Osmanis, W (top-to-mid round prospect, currently the most productive U18 player in Allsvenskan and is scoring at a higher rate than Victor Eklund who is a 1st round prospect. Extremely soft touch, great hands and hockey IQ)
Serkins, C (late round prospect, scoring at a PPG rate at the Swiss top juniors, had 4 points in 5 games at the U18 Worlds this year as a 16 yo, his major drawback is his smallish frame and he should probably move to wing)
2026:
Murnieks, C (1st round prospect, most points scored by a 15 yo in the Latvian league, YOG MVP with 27 goals in 4 games, productive at the 2024 U18 Worlds at the age of 15, USHL after just turning 16)
Berzkalns, C (mid round prospect, USHL tender as a 15 yo, he was dominating the Latvian U17s together with Murnieks, but Berzkalns still has to prove he can elevate his game at the international level)
Naudins, W (top-to-mid round prospect, NCAA-commit. at 15 yo, drafted at 15yo by Muskegon in USHL, 2nd highest scoring player currently at USHS-Prep, a massive 2-meter frame, was the highest scoring player the Latvian U20 dev. camp this summer)
Klaucans, C (mid-round prospect, just turned 16 and he's currently the only 16 yo playing in NAHL, made the Latvian U18 roster at the 2024 U18 Worlds and was productive, expecting him to move to major junior hockey during or after this season)
Flugins, W (mid-to-late round prospect, played at J20 Nationell and was relatively productive at 16 yo, made the U18 Worlds roster last year as well. Since he's a skill-player/dangler type with a smaller frame, he's more of a late round prospect unless he can really improve this season which is going to be tough for him as he decided to move to CHL from a comfy spot in Sweden)
There's a bunch of other prospects, but these should get drafted. The breadth and depth of the Latvian program has improved with the current generation of junior players in general, as this is the point when hockey reached a peak after Riga hosted the Worlds in 2006 and several ice rinks were built afterwards.
So the entire team is solid and well-rounded and there's about 150 U18 kids playing in top tier junior leagues in Sweden, Finland (Riga plays in the Finnish junior system with several teams), Switzerland, Czechia, Germany, US, Canada. So the depth has improved as well.
Many are going the NCAA way through USHS, USHL or NAHL and we currently have 18 NCAA Div 1 players, with the number set to increase even further.
There hasn't been a point in history with that many draft prospects and such depth, so you're completely wrong on both counts.
SoundAndFury
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It's obviously still early but Murnieks easily carries the highest pre-draft pedigree since Girgensons and Osmanis is as good as anything Latvia has produced in recent years. So this generation is more or less as good as the 2012 draft only with a decent supporting cast too, this time.
It's not earth-shattering but certainly very strong by Latvian standards.
Pretty much on point, but:
1. Doubt that Serkins will be drafted. No one knows that swiss juniors exist. He may be drafted after one of the WJC, especially if he makes the U20 team and is productive there.
2. Im higher on Berzkalns and, especially, Flugins. Berzkalns might be another top prospect, and Flugins is almost guaranteed a middle round selection if he progresses on a steady trajectory. OHL in D-1 year is no joke;
3. I dont know what to make of this USHS-prep, so I would ease a little with the top-mid round projection for Naudins until he plays at a higher level.
Serkins was the 6th highest scoring 16yo at the U18 Worlds. He can definitely get drafted, but you are right that it is entirely dependent on his international showing, which was my point as well.
I guess you're on the younger side yourself. Not to worry young padawan, Blueger was drafted straight out of the same USHS-Prep team as Naudins plays for currently. He does not have to move to a better league at all, he's already NCAA-committed
SoundAndFury
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It's a story as old as hills but with Serkins size, no way he is getting drafted out of Switzerland unless he does something truly spectacular which I don't think he is capable of. Your typical high-risk, no-reward kind of pick.
Considering his birthday, he has a better chance to be drafted as an overager (much like his club mate Benny Baumgartner if he gets to that level) than this summer.
Considering his birthday, he has a better chance to be drafted as an overager (much like his club mate Benny Baumgartner if he gets to that level) than this summer.
For very few people the world has focused on the Latvian hockey players born in 2007 and 2008 so yes for me the main source on this matter is EP. And since the difference between EP's assessment and reality is two may-be draftees, I must admit that EP gives pretty full picture. I knew about Klaucans and would have been slightly disappointed if I had to do my own research to only find Naudins, no matter how well he is doing in school sports.
Anyway thanks for the list!
Thus, over the next two years 4 or 5 Latvian players will be more or less guaranteed to get drafted, one of them possibly in the first round. I was hoping to learn about extremely (!) talented generation (!) but English is not my first language so maybe it's a matter of terminology or translation.
Dude, did you expect 3 top 5 selections when you heard about the "extremely talented generation"? Obviously it is meant as an "extremely talented generation" for Latvia, or for a non top-8 (or how many teams are considered "top" right now, whatever) team.
Latvia's best draft was in 2012, when Girgensons was selected in the first round and Blueger in the second. Both are full time NHLers now. However, there were no top 100 selections for 5 years prior to that, and only 3 top 100 selections in the next 12 years. So obviously, having another first rounder paired with up to 3-4 top 100 selections in the span of 2 years would be a historic generation for Latvia and a notable achievement for any nation apart from Canada, Russia, USA, Czechia, Finland, Sweden and Slovakia.
In over 100 years of ice hockey being played in Latvia, there has not been a generation as talented as this one. Neither in terms of NHL draftees, nor in terms of overall depth. Ergo, this U18 team is going to be hands down the most stacked junior team in Latvian history and I can't wait to see them play.
Personally, that seems like a very straightforward point. I can translate it into Simple English for you.
Latvia kid team good. Small country, many good player. More NHL player coming.
Hope that helped.
Belarusian posters, having fewer prospects of such calibre, can't stop auto-fellatio-ing themselves on these boards and claiming they will supercede Slovakia by Monday.
I think this thread caused you some heartburn and a desperate need to write that pissy post of yours.
You can continue now.
I was probably confused by the words of your fellow countryman:
So yes, I expected to see something maybe what Slovakia has had over last years. In fact, this is a prospect of getting to where Belarus already is, but I would not call our current generation extremely talented, especially compared to what I expect in 5-7 years.
I would think that 99% of Belarusians consider the generation led by Levshunov to be extremely talented, even though you do, currently, lack other top-end talent behind him. Are your expectations regarding the next 5-7 years based on facts or just wishful thinking? Since, using your same EP draft list metric, next three years look rather calm, to put it lightly.
I'm talking more about 5-7 year distance (2011-2013-born kids). A lot has changed for the better in recent years and it should lead to more talent and depth. Will see.
Back to U20s now.
As rosy as our U18s might look, after about a month of hockey being played, the showing of Latvian 05' born players has been very underwhelming so far, apart from Mateiko, Bulans and maybe Feldbergs. The same goes for a few C tier '06 born prospects who would normally fill up our bottom 6 and have been mediocre so far.
This is going to cause a big old headache for the Latvian U20 HQ, because calling up triple underagers is starting to look like the only option at hand.
A bunch of our 05s and 06s have moved to NAHL (expected due to NCAA alure) and are not delivering. A bunch have moved to the Czech U20s, which is starting to look like a new direction for older Latvian-based prospects. Barely anyone's delivering there.
So what do you do when you have an 08' Klaucans outproducing everyone else at NAHL?
In short, we're likely going to have a 16 year old and a 17 year old on our top line, and probably the youngest team in the tournament by a country mile.
We should have no issue beating Kazakhstan, but this U20 team is at least 2 years away from its peak.
As rosy as our U18s might look, after about a month of hockey being played, the showing of Latvian 05' born players has been very underwhelming so far, apart from Mateiko, Bulans and maybe Feldbergs. The same goes for a few C tier '06 born prospects who would normally fill up our bottom 6 and have been mediocre so far.
This is going to cause a big old headache for the Latvian U20 HQ, because calling up triple underagers is starting to look like the only option at hand.
A bunch of our 05s and 06s have moved to NAHL (expected due to NCAA alure) and are not delivering. A bunch have moved to the Czech U20s, which is starting to look like a new direction for older Latvian-based prospects. Barely anyone's delivering there.
So what do you do when you have an 08' Klaucans outproducing everyone else at NAHL?
In short, we're likely going to have a 16 year old and a 17 year old on our top line, and probably the youngest team in the tournament by a country mile.
We should have no issue beating Kazakhstan, but this U20 team is at least 2 years away from its peak.
SoundAndFury
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This sounds overconfident. It's going to be a very tough game, this is probably the strongest Kazakh U20 team ever.
Their U18s won against the Czechs in OT last year and only lost the relegation game to Norway in the shootout. From that team Sarkenov went to Spokane and is flirting with PPG pace there, Korneyev just turned 17 a few weeks ago but is holding in in the QMJHL and Cherkasov is leading his MHL team in scoring, by a fair margin too.
Furthermore, these guys are just a supplement to their '05 class that features Ottawa's draft pick Vladimir Nikitin few weeks away from his 20th birthday in goal, Alexander Kim from NAHL's Bismarck Bobcats, and the core of Astana's MHL team that is actually having a decent season with 3 kids scoring over PPG there. Not to mention the advantage of mostly playing together.
Sure Latvia are undoubtedly the favorites but I really can't see them having an overwhelming advantage there.
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I don't think the assumption that we're losing to Germany is in any way overconfident, as we beat them last year. To lose against both is possible, but quite unlikely.
With all due respect, Vladimir Nikitin is not a very good goalie. Karlis Mezsargs is a pretty good comparable. Everyone else you brought up would fit the 'mediocre' and 'underwhelming' labels I used in my post as well.
Alexander Kim scored 7 points in 20 games in the Finnish juniors and is barely above 0.5 PPG in NAHL. That's not impressive in any meaning of the word. That's not even impressive for DivIA. Livsics will likely not even make the Latvian roster and he's scoring at twice the rate. Trockis didn't even make the U18s.
Irrespective of how 'strong' Kazakhstan is, let's just agree that Latvia does run some risk of losing, so obviously the main goal of this group is going to be to stay up.
SoundAndFury
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He isn't supposed to be impressive, he is a depth player for their team. If you wanted to discuss impressive you could have written about Sarkenov whose performance this year pretty much matches Mateiko (albeit on a deeper team) or Orazov who is well over PPG as a defenseman in the MHL to go with few minutes here and there in the KHL.
But anyway, this wasn't about the specifics. If they could beat the Czechs, they can definitely challenge Latvia.
