Prior to the NHL Draft Lottery, I would have put Ivar Stenberg’s odds of going first overall at 30-40%. Gavin McKenna has always been my personal pick for No. 1, but there was definitely a scenario where a team like Florida or Winnipeg won the lottery and selected the more NHL-ready Stenberg to either extend their championship window or push back into playoff contention.
I never imagined I’d be sitting here in mid-June writing about him potentially falling into the Chicago Blackhawks’ lap at fourth overall.
Everything’s bigger in Texas the NHL
It’s funny what one inch can do for your reputation and draft stock.
According to Elite Prospects, Stenberg is 6’0″, 181 pounds.
According to the NHL Combine, Stenberg is 5’11”, 183 pounds.
According to me? I don’t care, and neither should you.
3 nights ago, the Carolina Hurricanes won the Stanley Cup for the second time in franchise history. Their team, coached by Rod Brind’Amour, has found a masterful balance between shot frequency and quality, while maximizing puck possession.
In the regular season at 5v5, the Hurricanes ranked:
- 1st in Corsi For (4621)
- 1st in Corsi % (59.78%)
- 2nd in Shots For (2070)
- 1st in Shots For % (57.66%)
- 1st in Scoring Chances (2205)
- 1st in Scoring Chance % (57.57%)
- 1st in High Danger Scoring Chances (889)
- 4th in High Danger Scoring Chance % (55.15%)
These trends remained true in the playoffs, and it was a great showing of how modern hockey is played. Using your speed efficiently, extending possession by any means necessary, and once you lose possession, forecheck the tired defense, force a turnover, and strike on the counter.
Why am I bringing this up? It’s because despite the fact that they forecheck hard up and down the lineup, and maintain possession of the puck better than any team in hockey, they lack size.
4 Hurricanes players produced more than 10 5v5 points these playoffs. Jackson Blake (5’11”, 185lbs), Taylor Hall (6’1″, 210lbs), Logan Stankoven (5’8″, 165lbs), and Nikolaj Ehlers (6’0″, 168lbs).
Other than Hall, the Hurricanes top producers were smaller than average players. This isn’t to say that size isn’t important. There are analytics to backup that size on the backend matters, and traditionally you want your centers to be a bit larger (whether it’s in height or weight) to help low in the D Zone, whether it’s with their body or stick.
But to look at Ivar Stenberg and say “He’s 5’11”, 181 pounds, he might not be big enough to be a star in the NHL” is completely ridiculous.
Ivar The Great
“The game is won or lost in the neutral zone” – Scotty Bowman
The neutral zone is extremely underappreciated by the average hockey fan, and that’s understandable. Goals don’t occur from the neutral zone, and big, open ice hits rarely occur anymore.
In reality however, a team’s ability to successfully enter the zone, or stop entries against is often a great indicator of team performance.
52.9% of goals originate off of the cycle/forecheck. This stat might seem to counter my previous statement, however by stopping your opponent before they enter the zone, you prevent a team from being able to cycle effectively.
Here are some other stats about rush vs. cycle offense
- On the Rush/Forecheck, shooting percentage is 8.6%. Take away rebounds and this drops to 7.7%
- Off the Rush, Shooting percentage is 9.9%
- On the Forecheck, cross slot passes accounted for 3.8% of all shots, with a 15.8% shooting percentage
- Off the Rush, cross slot passes accounted for 5.6% of all shots, with a 22.5% shooting percentage.
- On the Cycle, Low-to-High passes make up 18.5% of all passes. The shooting percentage from these passes are 2.7%. If you include point shot deflections, this increases to 4.2%
- Rushes that start from Defensive Zone Counters have a 17.5% shooting percentage, and make up 17.4% of all rushes.
- Rushes that start from Neutral Zone turnovers have an 11.1% shooting percentage and make up 13.1% of all rushes.
- Rushes that start from a DZ retrieval/exit have an 8.1% shooting percentage but make up 32.6% of all rushes
So, how does this affect Stenberg?
This play between Canucks 5v5 scoring leader Linus Karlsson, NHL 2026 Top Prospect Viggo Björck, and Stenberg is a great example of Stenberg’s ability.
If we look back at the beginning of this section, we will see that Stenberg had a transition score of 4.38 in the SHL. 4 is elite. 4.38 is off the charts elite.
The SHL is not just some random men’s league, either. It is often ranked 2nd in the world in terms of talent (yes, even higher than the KHL). Stenberg put up a historic 18 year-old campaign, only trailing Henrik and Daniel Sedin in terms of points in a single season all time, and tying Henrik for most assists in a season by a player aged 18.
Plays like the one above are reasons why he found that level of success.
When Czechia turns the puck over right outside their blueline, Ivar carries the puck west to east. This pulls all 3 Czech players in the DZ over towards the middle of the ice, with the far side man making an aggressive move on Stenberg, in an attempt to force a turnover or forcing the other 2 Swedish forwards offside.
Stenberg slams on the breaks and makes a hard cut towards the inside lane. This gets him away from the attacker, but it also stops his momentum dead in it’s tracks. This gives one of the other 2 Czech DZ players confidence to attack, believing Stenberg has no way of getting around him.
Instead of chipping the puck in, Ivar stickhandles to his backhand to lure the defender in even more, and chips the puck against the defender’s momentum, to his left side (important to note as the defender is right handed, allowing him to avoid the stick) and behind him to a streaking Linus Karlsson. This creates a 2-on-1, which Karlsson is able to take advantage of, dishing a perfect pass to Björck, who buries the pass.
When Stenberg makes his pass, he is in the middle of a Czech triangle at the blueline, with a 4th defender caught puck watching.
The situational awareness to know where his wingers are, chipping it away from the Czech player’s stick, and not panicking with all of the pressure being placed on him at the blueline paints a picture of a player wise beyond his years.
He doesn’t make a selfish play, but he also makes sure to not kill the chance. He attacks the middle lane and creates a high danger scoring opportunity for his linemates.
This is what stars do.
Let’s look at another example.
When Ivar picks up the puck, he is basically at top speed, against a defenseman who just turned to skate backwards. The entry is the easy part here.
What is difficult however, is finding a way to beat the defender while managing to avoid any back pressure being applied, especially since Stenberg is alone on this rush.
He crosses the blueline, and on his backhand attacks the middle. The Slovak defenseman clearly believes that Stenberg’s objective is to cut in and across on his backhand in an attempt to get between him and the oncoming backcheck, perhaps hoping to pass the defender and use him as a pick against the backchecker.
Stenberg in making this move to his backhand early, gives himself time to scan the ice and make a decision.
1. He either cuts across the ice on his backhand and either takes a shot or attempts to power to the net. or
2. He holds the puck on his backhand as long as possible to bait the defenseman into attempting to pinch him between himself and the backchecker, and cuts away from the pressure.
This choice is made depending on the commitment of the defenseman. If he relaxes in an attempt to take away the cutback, he will accelerate and attempt to pass the d man before the backchecker arrives. Instead, the defenseman dedicates himself to cutting off the lane on Stenberg’s backhand.
Stenberg slams on the breaks, cuts to his forehand (and in the process, breaking the Czech d man’s ankles), and without any additional stick handles, rifles a shot into the top corner.
There are moments where you want a player to meet pressure with pressure. Attacking into traffic as a way of getting to the middle in order to force the defense to make a play. However, there are also times where you want a player to avert from pressure as a means of maintaining possession and allowing reinforcements to arrive into the OZ.
With this play, Stenberg used the threat of meeting pressure with pressure as a way of both averting from it, and creating a high danger chance that just so happened to end with a beautiful goal.
Again, this is what stars do.
Size of the Fight In The Dog
When you look at Stenberg’s size, you have to ask whether or not a lot of his best traits will translate against the worlds best and biggest defensemen. However, like I mentioned with the Carolina Hurricanes top playoff scorers this season, size doesn’t matter if you can fight upwards.
Not only can Stenberg fight upwards, it’s what he’s trained himself to do.
Stenberg has exceptional lower body strength, and uses this to his advantage to create space for himself and teammates. He consistently rolls off checks, and displays great proficiency at protecting the puck with one hand. He also pops off of checks while maintaining possession, allowing him to extend plays and draw in additional defensemen that attempt to double team Stenberg along the wall.
This, combined with his ability to delay plays as long as possible to create the most advantageous situations possible gives Stenberg a highly projectable skill set once he makes the leap to the NHL. I would argue his skill set is more projectable than even Gavin McKenna’s, although McKenna has far higher top end skill, and thus a higher offensive ceiling.
Ivar The Terrible
There aren’t many flaws in Stenberg’s game, however the few he has can potentially limit his ceiling as an offensive player and two-way winger.
His skating is good. He creates speed in his crossovers, and displays a fantastic combo of balance and agility. Where he lacks is in his explosiveness and top speed.
As his skating currently stands, it’s easy to see a world where he dominants against middle and bottom pair defensemen. However, the lack of explosiveness will make it a struggle to beat high end defenseman, those of which typically have high end IQ and great skating, regardless of size.
By working on these, he will be able to produce regardless of who he is out on the ice against.
From a defensive standpoint, Stenberg is also beyond his years. He is a fantastic forechecker, and shows an ability to work along the walls. However, he’s still a winger, and young wingers will often show a level of passiveness in some area of their defensive game that can cause holes in their team’s defense.
With Stenberg, his main defensive deficiency is his passiveness off the backcheck. He will often float up high in the DZ in an attempt to pick off a pass rather than attacking a player in an attempt to force a turnover. You will also often find that his passive nature will result in opposing offenses being able to create chances that would not have occurred otherwise.
The skating is a bigger issue to me than his defensive game, however.
His hockey IQ and work ethic are extremely high, so with proper development and coaching, his defensive game should come around.
If his defensive game was as bad as other young SHL’ers, he wouldn’t have gotten as much ice time as he did. The SHL is not a development league. Teams are there to win, and countries like Sweden and Finland are often reluctant to give young players ice time over established veterans.
Wrap Up
“You want to go as high you can, but No. 1 has been nothing I think about. I start laughing when I think about going No. 1.” – Ivar Stenberg
Ivar Stenberg is going to be an elite winger in the NHL. I project his ceiling as being an 85 point winger, with the potential of a couple 90-95 point seasons in the perfect environment.
He isn’t the type of winger that will get Selke Trophy votes, but he will be an all situations winger, with Top PP unit and 2nd/3rd PK unit time.
His work ethic, forecheck, and transition game will make him a nightmare for opposing defenses, both offensively and defensively.
From a player comparable standpoint, he reminds me of Henrik Zetterberg, who while primarily a center, did frequently play wing in his NHL career. His combination of puck protection, playmaking and two way play is too difficult for me to ignore.
If Stenberg is available at #3 for the Canucks, he borders on being an automatic selection in my eyes. However if Stenberg is available at 3, that means the player I’ll be writing about on Monday was likely selected by the San Jose Sharks.
On Monday, I write about Soo Greyhound’s defenseman Chase Reid.
Thank you for reading!
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