The AHL affiliate of the New Jersey Devils, the Utica Comets, are set to kick off their season Friday, October 10. For the second season in a row, the Comets missed the playoffs in 2024-25 after posting a 31-33-6-2 record. This ranked Utica last in the North Division and 26th in the league overall. A horrific start to the year was just too much to overcome.
Utica began the year with a 13 game losing streak that culminated in the firing of their former head coach Kevin Dineen. Current head coach Ryan Parent took the reins and helped the Comets to a 31-23-5 record to end the season. As a reward for his work the interim tag was removed and Parent was officially named the club’s head coach in June.
If the team wants to return to the playoffs in 2025-26, the Comets will need to be one of the top-five finishers in the AHL’s North Division by the end of the division’s 72 game slate. The top three North Division teams will get an automatic advancement to the second round, while the No. 4 and 5 teams in the North will need to play in a best-of-three series. In all, 23 of the league’s 32 teams qualify for the Calder Cup playoffs.
All of Utica’s games will be streamed via FloHockey, but a subscription will be needed. We will have season-long coverage of the team via weekly update reports and updates throughout the year across our social media pages.
The Roster
The Comets announced their opening night roster Monday evening. The group consists of 16 forwards, 10 defensemen, and four goaltenders. The roster features a nice blend of young prospects within the organization and some veterans.
Since the announcement, the team added prospect forwards Lenni Hämeenaho and Shane Lachance from the preliminary NHL roster. They replaced them with tough guy, and newest Devil acquisition Zack MacEwen, who is better suited to be a healthy scratch than either Hämeenaho or Lachance who need to play as much as possible.
In addition, they assigned forwards Alexander Campbell, Cam Squires, and Dylan Wendt to Adirondack (ECHL) as well as defensemen Luke Reid and Jeremy Hanzel and goaltender Tyler Brennan. Lastly, goaltender Georgi Romanov, who was on a professional try-out contract was scooped up by St. Louis and has left the organization.
A notable roster construction aspect of the AHL is their rules involving veteran skaters. As it stands, the Comets have one veteran forward (Schmelzer), one veteran-exempt forward (Gruden), one veteran defenseman (White), and two veteran-exempt defensemen (Strand, Addison). AHL teams need to ice a minimum of 12 skaters that have played fewer than 260 professional games. They are allowed one skater that have played between 260 and 320 professional games (veteran exempt). Lastly, they are allowed a maximum of five skaters have played over 320 professional games (veteran). This is likely a big reason as to why veteran Kevin Rooney, who was on a professional try-out contact, left the organization to sign a two-way deal elsewhere.
In Wednesday’s practice, two days prior to their Friday season opener against Cleveland, the Comets were skated in the following line according to Ben Birnell of Sentinel Media.
Forwards
Mike Hardman – Angus Crookshank – Thomas Bordeleau
Shane Lachance – Ryan Schmelzer – Lenni Hämeenaho
Xavier Parent – Matyas Melovsky – Brian Halonen
Jonathan Gruden – Jack Malone – Nathan LĂ©gáre
Defensemen
Calen Addison – Colton White
Ethan Edwards – Austin Strand
Jackson van de Leest – Dimitri Osipov
Goaltenders
Nico Daws
Jakub Málek
Extras: F Josh Filmon, F Tag Bertuzzi, D Mikaël Diotte, D Topias Vilén
Forwards
The two most notable prospects playing for Utica, to at least start the season, are Lenni Hämeenaho and Shane Lachance. In our preseason organizational prospect rankings, Hämeenaho ranks No. 4 and Lachance No. 7.
Hämeenaho, 20 years old, is beginning his first full season in North America. He played his junior years in the top Finnish professional league (Liiga) the last three years, posting 20 goals and 51 points in 58 games his final season. The 2023 second-round pick had 103 points across 155 career Liiga games. Meanwhile, Lachance finished up his college hockey career with a National Championship loss last year. As a captain with Boston University, the 6-foot-5 forward had 30 points in 40 games in 2024-25. He ended the season with a two-game run with Utica, scoring two points.
The forward group is also anchored by a group of veterans that include captain Ryan Schmelzer, Brian Halonen, and Mike Hardman. Schmelzer has been the team’s captain since 2021-22; the year the Devils’ AHL affiliate relocated from Binghamton to Utica. The 32-year-old, who led the Comets in scoring last season (44 points in 72 games), is entering his eighth AHL season, all of which has been spent in the Devils’ system.
Halonen and Hardman ranked second and fifth, respectively, in scoring last season for Utica. Halonen, now 26, scored a team-leading 27 goals. He has 66 goals across 166 career AHL games which is a 29-goal pace over a typical 72 game AHL slate. Hardman, 26, is entering his second season with the Comets, scoring 18 goals in 57 games last year. He has 122 points across 221 career AHL games.
Matyas Melovksy, Josh Filmon, and Thomas Bordeleau are a trio of intriguing prospects on the roster. Melovksy is entering his first full professional season at 21 years old. The former sixth-round pick exploded for 83 points (57 assists) in his final junior season in the QMJHL.
Filmon, also 21, had a huge 2022-23 season in the WHL (47 goals in 64 games), however, has regressed since. In 2024-25, he had 36 points in 65 ECHL games and was held scoreless in 12 AHL games in his first professional. Lastly, Bordeleau was acquired in July in exchange for forward Shane Bowers. Bordeleau, 23, had 38 points in 59 AHL games last season. He has 107 points in 161 career AHL games and has appeared in 44 NHL games (18 points).
Angus Crookshank, Xavier Parent, Nathan Légáre, Jack Malone, Jonathan Gruden, and Tag Bertuzzi make up a group of middle-aged prospects which complement the roster nicely.
Crookshank is in his first season with Utica after spending the first five seasons of his AHL career with Belleville. He has 149 points across 202 career AHL games and had 40 points (22 goals) across 62 games last year. Parent, 24, is entering his fourth year professionally. He was fourth on the team in scoring last season (36 points in 61 games). Across 146 career AHL games, he has 87 points. His final junior season in the QMJHL was special, as he had 106 points in 65 games back in 2021-22.
LĂ©gáre, 24, had a breakout with Utica last season scoring a career-high 17 goals and 25 points, he also added 102 penalty minutes. He has a legitimate chance to contribute on the fourth line in the NHL at some point this season. Malone is also 24 and joined the Comets’ organization straight from Boston College in 2023-24. Last season was his first full professional year, posting 13 points in 57 games. Most notably, he had a three-goal opening period on January 22.
Gruden was acquired in the Cody Glass trade last year. Gruden, 25, was a fourth-round pick in 2018. he had five points in 18 games after the trade last year. Overall, he has 114 points across 268 carer AHL games and has skated in 16 NHL games. Lastly, Bertuzzi is a veteran of 132 ECHL games scoring at a solid rate (99 points), but only has played in 16 AHL games.
Defensemen
The Utica defensive core is led by a foursome of veteran players. Colton White, Austin Strand, Calen Addison, and Dimitri Osipov have all played in more than 135 career AHL games and, besides Osipov, have NHL experience. Both Strand and White are 28 years old, Osipov is 29, while Addison is 25. Strand was acquired in an AHL trade in January of 2025 from Rockford. He has played in 298 AHL games and 26 NHL games over his career. White, who was drafted by the Devils in 2015, spent his first five seasons within the organization before departing for two seasons to Anaheim. He retuned last season, posting 21 points in 61 games. He has played in 315 AHL games and 84 NHL games in his career.
Addison, who was signed this offseason spent the season last year between Henderson and Springfield in the AHL posting 36 points across 62 games. Overall, he has played in 139 AHL games (94 points) and 152 NHL games. His longest run in the NHL came across the 2022 and 2023 seasons where he played in 134 NHL games with Minnesota and San Jose. Lastly, Osipov was acquired from Hershey in an AHL deal in November of 2024 in exchange for forward Jace Isley. The 29-year-old won the Calder Cup with the Bears and has played in 231 career ECHL games and 123 career ECHL games throughout his career. He skated in 39 games with Utica down the stretch last year.
Ethan Edwards, Topias Vilén, and Mikaël Diotte are three intriguing prospects that are once again slated to be with the team. Edwards and Vilén each rank inside the top 17 in our preseason organizational prospect rankings.
Edwards got a lengthy run with the Devils in preseason as Luke Hughes worked through his negotiations and Brett Pesce was banged up. Edwards, 23, played 130 NCAA games before ending his Michigan career last season. He was able to skate in 10 games with Utica to end the year. VilĂ©n, now 22, was a fifth-round find in 2021 and has played in 112 AHL games within the organization. He had played in 127 Liiga games prior to making the move to North America. Lastly, Diotte, who signed an entry-level deal in 2022, won the QMJHL’s Kevin Lowe Trophy (top defensive defenseman) in his final junior league season as he was a staggering plus-55 that year. In his first professional season last year, he was limited to seven games between the AHL and ECHL levels due to injury.
Jackson van de Leest rounds out the current Utica defensive roster. Van de Leest, who brings a bit of an edge, is 24 years old and was an undrafted free agent out of the WHL and the Canadian university ranks. He has been within the Devils’ organization since making the leap top professional hockey in 2023-24 skating in 63 ECHL games and 12 AHL games.
Goalies
Utica is entering the season with a very intriguing goalie tandem of Nico Daws and Jakub Málek. Daws, the “veteran” of the two, has 98 AHL games and 52 NHL games under his belt. Hw owns a career 0.901 save percentage in the AHL and a 0.898 mark in the NHL. The 24-year-old, former third-round pick, had by far his best run in the NHL, posting a 0.939 save percentage across six games last season. In all though, he owns a career neagtive-6.74 goals saved above expected in his NHL career.
Málek, meanwhile, is the intriguing young prospect. He enters the season No. 6 in our organization prospect rankings. The 23-year-old has already played 82 games professionally at the Liiga level in Finland. Across those games, he posted a 0.910 save percentage and 2.18 goals against average. After posting a 0.915 save percentage in 2023-24 (27 games), he followed that up with a 0.910 figure this past season (33 games). He is a former fourth-round pick in 2021.
Other Who May Factor
There are a plethora of others who may factor in with Utica at some point. These are either beginning with the big club or starting in the ECHL with the Adirondack Thunder.
The two most notable currently listed on the Devils’ roster is Zack MacEwen and Juho Lammikko. MacEwen is a grinder/enforcer type who the Devils acquired October 3 in exchange for Kurtis MacDermid. MacEwen, 29, has 122 points and 193 penalty minutes across 190 career AHL games.
Lammikko, who would need to clear waivers to join Utica, was signed from the NL (Swiss top professional league) in June. He had 38 points in 48 NL games last season and in all scored 112 points across 144 games over the last three seasons. He left the NHL after the 2021-22 season. The 29-year-old, a third-round pick of Florida in 2014, has 26 points in 159 career NHL games. He is currently banged up but not on any type of injured reserve.
The most notable player who will certainly see AHL time this season is Cam Squires. The former fourth-round pick is 20 years old and had 75 points in his final 58 junior games last season. He had four points in three games to end the season with Utica last year. He is the Devils’ 11th-ranked prospect in our preseason organization rankings.
Both Dylan Wendt and Alexander Campbell were in camp with Utica and recently assigned to the ECHL Wendt, 24, was signed as an undrafted free agent out of Western Michigan. He impressed in his final collegiate season (44 points in 38 games), however, has largely underwhelmed professionally (five points in 17 AHL games; 28 points in 43 ECHL games). Campbell, 24, played in 23 professional games between the AHL and ECHL last season. He has 27 AHL games (nine points) with Milwaukee across 2023-24 and 2024-25.
A group of three defensemen currently with Adirondack who can see time with Utica this year are Luke Reid, Jeremy Hanzel, and Ryan Wheeler. Reid, 24, is a former sixth-round pick in 2020 and played in his first 11 professional games last season. He spent five seasons at the University of New Hampshire. Hanzel was acquired in the Erik Haula deal this offseason from Nashville. The 22-year-old was a sixth-round pick in 2023 and posted 22 points in 61 ECHL games last season. He had 60 points in 66 games in 2023-24, his final season in the WHL. Lastly, Wheeler is the veteran of the group at 28 years old. He made is AHL debut last season, but is a veteran of 201 ECHL games.
Jeremy Broduer and Tyler Brennan are two goaltender options for Utica if Daws or Málek are called for in the NHL or if there is an AHL injury. Broduer, son of Martin, is 28 years old and has a 0.909 career save percentage across 155 ECHL games. His 0.921 save percentage over only 10 AHL games is impressive. Meanwhile, Brennan was a fourth-round pick in 2022 and has spent the last two seasons in the ECHL posting an 0.883 save percentage across 42 games.
Preseason Prospect Rankings
As has been referenced several times above, our preseason organizational prospect rankings list came out in September. Below is where every one of the Comets roster who was eligible for ranking was ranked.
Forwards: Lenni Hämeenaho (No. 4), Shane Lachance (No. 7), Matyas Melovsky (No. 9), Thomas Bordeleau (No. 15), Xavier Parent (No. 21), Josh Filmon (No. 25), Nathan Légaré (No. 26), Jack Malone (No. 32), Tag Bertuzzi (No. 36)
Defensemen: Ethan Edwards (No. 13), Topias Vilén (No. 17), Mikaël Diotte (No. 29), Jackson van de Leest (No. 41)
Goalies: Jakub Málek (No. 6), Nico Daws (No. 14)
Below is the ranking of individuals who may not be on the roster, but will likely factor in at some point.
Forwards: Cam Squires (No. 11), Alexander Campbell (No. 23), Dylan Wendt (No. 37), Brain Carrabes (No. 43)
Defensemen: Jeremy Hanzel (No. 34), Luke Reid (No. 38),
Goalies: Tyler Brennan (No. 33)