Yegorov is a great example of how stats don’t always tell the full story. A goalie with a 3.86 GAA, 0.892 sv%, and 8-25-3 record going in the top 50 picks? Really? But fear not, there’s plenty of reason to like this selection.
No need to mince words here, the Omaha Lancers were a bad hockey team this year. Dead last in the USHL, and by a significant margin. Every Yegorov reviewing abounded with ridiculous turnovers from his defense, and him being frequently left out to dry on scoring chances. It should come as no surprise that he struggled to put up respectable numbers. In fact, no one on that roster, outside of a high schooler who had a couple hot starts to end the year, was able to. Of course, that’s not the only reason he had poor numbers, and I’ll get to that in a minute, but it’s imperative fans don’t solely focus on that.
Yegorov offers a high degree of athleticism with super quick reflexes. His movement across the net is quick and snappy, and while his lateral skating ability still stands to improve a bit, it’s not a significant limiting factor at this point. He’s extremely controlled when squaring up to a shooter, great at adjusting his stance if need be, and very hard to beat down low. Even in the butterfly, Yegorov’s 6’5” frame still feels large.
It’s not just about the physical attributes, though. Yegorov is a very unshakable goalie. He’s not bothered by forwards driving his net or challenging the ice around his crease. As mentioned, he pretty much got shelled night in and night out thanks to the defenders in front of him, and yet you could never be able to tell that given how carries himself in net; Yegorov is fiercely competitive irrespective of the score. He also seems to have a remarkable ability to mentally reset after blowout losses. It’s a testament to his character and competitiveness that he’s so unaffected by the scoreboard.
And from a scouting perspective, I actually prefer that he had to face so much action because I think it’s more likely to help him progress his game. Sure, system goalies getting sheltered behind a really good roster will put up significantly better stats, but they won’t be facing the same number breakdowns, follow-up attempts, or overall pressure in net. I want my goalie prospect facing shot after shot after shot.
A couple other positives worth mentioning: Yegorov is a pretty decent puckhandler. Not elite by any means, but assertive, and with a surprisingly good backhand. He also seems to have a very warm, candid personality from his interviews.
So, while Yegorov does have physical and mental strengths to his game, he also has weaknesses in both areas. Physically speaking, going back to his lateral movement issue, he has a tendency to overshoot save attempts and lose his crease. This occurs somewhat frequently and makes him look very slippery in net. The responsiveness to shot attempts is good, I do appreciate that, but he’s clearly overextending a lot of the time.
Positionally, he’s also not the best with his angles, which is particularly problematic on his glove side, which is not that great. Again, I appreciate that he’s aggressive in challenging shooters, but he can absolutely expose himself in the process, and the glove is simply not quick enough for him to recover.
Additionally, I wouldn’t say he’s the best at swallowing first attempts. This might not be an outright weakness because, generally speaking, I do trust his rebound control and ability to deflect pucks away from danger, but especially compared to some other goalies we passed on to land him, I don’t see the same ability to cleanly end scoring chances.
Mentally speaking, his puck tracking and anticipation are both just fine. Far from the worst in the class, but not a clear strength of his game either. It’s good that he’s pretty much undisturbed by the traffic in front of him, but that’s not to say he’s always able to keep an eye on the puck. I’m also left to wonder if some of his anticipation issues are influencing his overextensions in net. Perhaps it’s less of a mechanical thing and more an issue of him misjudging how and to where the puck is moving. Something that might support this notion is that, although much less frequently, he’ll also undershoot save attempts as well.
I believe the plan is for Yegorov to spend another year in Omaha and then head up to Boston University. I have no problem with this, particularly because I assume there just isn’t the same avenue for him to get playing time in BU if he were to go next season. As I said earlier, I want him getting reps more than anything, and I imagine staying with the Lancers will best accomplish that.
In terms of pick value, he wasn’t quite my top goalie available, which would’ve been Moysevich or Zarubin, but I still liked him in the late 2nd/early 3rd range, and had no problem with the team targeting the best NA-based goalie in the class. Russia really does seem to be the superior system for goalie development right now, but the NCAA route is still quite good. Plus, the team likely gets more control over his progression than they would have with Moysevich, who’s an overager signed for another 3 years, or Zarubin, who is probably a super long-term project.
All of this said, what type of hit am I forecasting from Yegorov? Truthfully, I have no idea, I’m not nearly good enough at projecting goalies like that. I wanted to take this opportunity to discuss the things I’m seeing, particularly the weaknesses, since it’ll help gauge how he’s progressing over the next few years.
Yegorov is certainly the most talented draft-day goalie we’ve taken in a near decade, and while he probably went a bit earlier than I would’ve picked him, it’s hard to argue with the staff if they had him ranked as their #1 target. Plus, since they had just seen Nabokov get taken about 10 spots earlier, I imagine they were worried about a run on goalies starting and felt the need to jump on the Marino trade to get their guy. Given how the remainder of the 2nd and early parts of the 3rd went, I would say they were correct to assume that.
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