A forensic prediction of the 2026 NHL Combine from the perspective of a player who was drafted in the 9th round in 1998 and held the Stanley Cup six years later.
Author: Martin Cibak, 2004 Stanley Cup Champion with the Tampa Bay Lightning, CIBAK HOCKEY IQ co-founder and Chief Hockey Officer.
Published: May 31, 2026, 11:11:11 a.m.
I / Hook: one building, the entire NHL
Six days. 32 GMs. And one Slovak, drafted there in 1998, says which of them they will regret in September.
Buffalo, May 30, 2026. In two days, on Monday, June 1, the NHL Scouting Combine will kick off at the LECOM Harborcenter. Six days, through June 6. And during those days, the entire NHL leadership will gather in one building: the general managers and scouting directors of all 32 clubs. The Buffalo Sabres have hosted the Combine every year since 2015. [1]
It was a different June in Buffalo that brought me to this league. In 1998, the NHL draft was held right here in this city, in a building that was then called Marine Midland Arena and will host the 2026 draft in less than a month as the KeyBank Center. [15] In that draft, the Tampa Bay Lightning selected me in the 9th round as the 252nd overall pick. But no one invited me to any Combine, and not because they overlooked me. The Combine, as we know it today, simply did not exist back then for players like me. I will come back to that later.
The Combine is one of the few moments in the year when the entire NHL front office is physically in one building. Whoever is not here is wasting a year of growth.
Over these six days, from Monday, June 1 to June 6, the top 90 prospects in the 2026 draft will undergo medical exams, fitness tests and, most importantly, interviews. [2] Those 90 names include 58 forwards, 27 defensemen and 5 goaltenders. In a typical year, the league invites approximately 100 players. [2]
The 2026 testing battery is rigorous and demanding: VO2max on a cycle ergometer, a 45-second Wingate anaerobic test, power jumps on a force plate, bench press, pull-ups, pro-agility, 10-meter sprint, and isokinetic squat, both new for the 2026 draft, plus comprehensive medical exams. And on top of all that: interviews. Each club sits the player down in front of four or five people and has roughly 15 to 20 minutes to figure out who this guy is. [2] Not as a player, because that is on the video. As a person.
And it is right here, in those twenty minutes, that every year the fate of five to ten players is decided: players who in September will either be the surprise of the year or a name that makes the GM say, "That interview should have been a warning."
II / European Top 5: Who is worth watching
Five names to remember before June 26.
The Toronto Maple Leafs won the draft lottery on May 5, 2026 with an 8.5% probability, the fifth-best among the 16 teams in the lottery, and will have the first pick. [3] It is their first No. 1 draft pick since Auston Matthews in 2016. The consensus says: Gavin McKenna of Penn State, 51 points (15+36) in 35 NCAA games, is going to be the No. 1 pick. [4] But right behind him is Europe, and it is exceptionally strong this year.
NHL Central Scouting has released its final rankings of international skaters. [5] Here are the five Europeans I am keeping an eye on in Buffalo:
| # CS | Name | Pos. | Club / League | Stats 25-26 | Age | Height / Weight | Note |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Ivar Stenberg | LW | Frolunda / SHL | 33 pts (11+22) / 43 | 18 | 180 cm / 83 kg | Most points by an 18-year-old in the SHL since the Sedin brothers in 1998-99 |
| 2 | Alberts Smits | LD | Jukurit / Liiga, on loan to Munich | 13 points / 38 games (Liiga) | 18 | 191 cm / 93 kg | Youngest player at the 2026 Winter Olympics; Latvia |
| 3 | Oliver Suvanto | C | Tappara / Liiga | 11 pts (2+9) / 48 | 17 | 191 cm / 94 kg | The most defensively mature center in the draft |
| 4 | Viggo Bjorck | C/RW | Djurgarden / SHL | 15 pts (6+9) / 42 | 18 | 175 cm / 80 kg | Centered the SHL team's first line at age 17 |
| 5 | Elton Hermansson | RW | MoDo / Allsvenskan | 21 pts (11+10) / 38 | 18 | 185 cm / 82 kg | Most productive U18 player in Allsvenskan |
Source: NHL Central Scouting, Final Rankings, International Skaters, May 2026. Statistics are for the regular season; several players added points in the playoffs and at international tournaments. [5]
What do I see in that table? Three Swedes, one Finn and one Latvian. Five countries, five different leagues, five different stories. And no Slovaks, which is a fact, not a criticism. I will get to that.
III / Forensic moment: who will fall short, who will surprise
Three names I expect to move up, and three I expect to struggle.
The Combine is not about who wins the Wingate test. The Combine is about who says something in the interview that changes the draft order.
Three players I expect to surprise on the upside
Alberts Smits. Latvian defenseman, 6'3", 205 lbs. He played most of the season with Jukurit in the Finnish Liiga, 13 points in 38 games, before being sent on loan to Munich on February 25. [5] Scouts stylishly compare him to a mix of Miro Heiskanen and Moritz Seider; that is my take, not an official assessment. The most compelling fact is this: he was the youngest player at the entire 2026 Winter Olympics in Milan-Cortina and played four games for Latvia, averaging 18:44 of ice time. [5] When an 18-year-old defenseman plays in the Olympics against adults and does not get lost, his Combine interview will be about one thing: mentality. And his is exceptional. I expect Smits to move into the top 5.
Elton Hermansson. A Swedish winger from MoDo. He plays in the Allsvenskan, Sweden's second division, and that is exactly the context that confuses everyone. Hermansson tallied 21 points (11+10) in 38 Allsvenskan games and was the most productive player under 18 in that league. [7] At the 2025 Hlinka Gretzky Cup, he added 11 points (6+5) in 5 games and finished second in the tournament's scoring race. [7] At the Combine, he will have to sell one thing: why he did not play in the SHL. If he answers correctly, and that answer is about development, not a lack of offers, he will move into the first round.
Oliver Suvanto. Tappara's 17-year-old center. Eleven points (2+9) in 48 Liiga games does not look like a first-round pick, unless you know he racked them up as one of the few 17-year-olds playing full-time in the men's Liiga and that his defensive play is at a level you see once every three or four years at this age. [8] He split the season between Tappara's U20 program and the professional Liiga. Suvanto will not have the best numbers at the Combine. He will have the best answers.
Three players I expect to have issues with
Nikita Klepov. Beware of a common misconception: Klepov is not a player in the Russian MHL. He is an American winger of Russian descent who played for the Saginaw Spirit in the Canadian OHL during the 2025-26 season and led the league in scoring with 97 points (37+60) in 67 games. [5] In the final Central Scouting rankings, he is #16 among North American skaters. His shot is elite; the question is elsewhere: consistency in his off-puck play and the pace the NHL will force upon him. His Combine will determine whether he can convince them he is more than just a shooter.
Viggo Bjorck. A paradox. He centered Djurgarden's first line at 17 and had the most ice time among the team's forwards in the playoffs. That is impressive. [5] But 5'9" and 176 lbs in the SHL is not the same as 5'9" and 176 lbs in the NHL. Combine tests, especially the Wingate and strength metrics, will show where he stands physically. And if he is significantly below average, his draft stock could slip from the top to the middle of the first round.
Oscar Hemming. A 6-foot-4 Finnish physical forward who transferred to Boston College (NCAA) mid-season and racked up 8 points in 19 games there. [9] The story sounds good: size, toughness, American college hockey. But a mid-season move to the NCAA always raises one question: why now? And the answer has to be convincing at the Combine.
IV / "Bust risk": what the translation factors say
KHL translation ~0.73. SHL lower. And what does that mean for Europe 2026?
I have to be precise here, because this is an area where emotions most often replace data. And right off the bat, one honest note: conversion factors are not a law of nature. They vary by model and author. I take them as indicative ranges, not as fixed numbers.
Patrick Bacon of Top Down Hockey and other analysts have long calculated the so-called NHLe, NHL equivalency. [10] The principle is simple: approximately how many points a player would accumulate in the NHL if his production in the domestic league were translated using a conversion factor. The approximate ranges according to published models look like this:
| League | NHLe (approximate) | What this means |
|---|---|---|
| KHL (Russia) | ~0.73 | Highest European factor, but with a catch (see below) |
| SHL (Sweden) | ~0.55-0.60 | 1 point in the SHL approximately equals 0.55-0.60 points in the NHL |
| Liiga (Finland) | ~0.50-0.55 | Comparable to the SHL; some models rank it lower |
| DEL (Germany) | ~0.40-0.45 | Mid-level; some models list ~0.35 |
| Allsvenskan (Sweden, 2nd division) | ~0.35-0.40 | Significantly lower conversion rate than the SHL |
| MHL (Russia Jr.) | ~0.25-0.30 | Lowest relevant league; models vary considerably |
Source: NHLe models, Patrick Bacon / Top Down Hockey, Chatel, "Wilson method." Factors vary between models; Liiga and DEL fall at the upper end of published ranges. [10, 11]
The KHL factor of ~0.73 is the highest, and that is exactly the catch. The KHL produces players who look statistically ready. But the transition to the NHL is a different sport. No serious model has published the exact failure rate of KHL imports; the figure is said to be around 40%, but even that is just an estimate. Fragmentary public data suggest that the reality is even harsher: of a small sample of high-scoring KHL imports from recent years, barely a third have made it in the NHL. So I take this as a rough guide, not as fact.
The stories vary. Artemiy Panarin is a clear success story. After a 74-point rookie year in Vancouver, Andrei Kuzmenko moved through Calgary and Philadelphia to Los Angeles and remained in the NHL. [10] Nikita Gusev had a strong first year in New Jersey (44 points in 66 games), but he faded in his second season and returned to the KHL, where he later broke the league's scoring record with 89 points in a season, a mark that has since been matched. [10] Three names, three completely different trajectories, and that is the whole point.
Adaptation is not about points. It is about 82 games, a smaller rink and a culture where you are expected to be coachable. Domestic league stats will not tell you that.
That is why when I look at Stenberg in the SHL, factor ~0.55-0.60, but he played the entire year against men, I see less risk than in purely junior seasons with a factor around 0.25-0.30. Not because he is necessarily a better player. Because his environment was closer to NHL reality.
V / Insider: what I was looking for when I was drafted in the 9th round
252nd overall. Tampa Bay, 1998. And why I was not invited to any Combine.
In June 1998, Tampa Bay selected me in the 9th round of the NHL draft. Number 252. [12] Back then, the draft had nine rounds; today it has seven. In the 1998 draft guide, I was listed as 44th among Europeans: one of the last names on the final pages. [15] No one invited me to any Combine.
And here I must be historically accurate, because this entire story hinges on it. The Combine in its modern form, roughly 90 invitees, structured team interviews and a full battery of fitness tests, did not move to Buffalo until 2015. [1, 15] Before that, starting in 1994, it was a much more intimate event held near Toronto, for about a hundred of the highest-rated prospects. The ninth round and the 44th European were not among them. No one "saw" me, not because scouting had failed, but because the system that sees almost everyone today did not exist back then.
And yet, six years later, I was standing on the ice with Vincent Lecavalier, Brad Richards and Martin St. Louis, holding the Stanley Cup.
I was drafted in the 9th round. 252nd overall. This is a guide for today's players, not for those going in the first round. For those who are coming to Buffalo this week and think no one is watching them.
What did I learn? Three things.
First: you will forget your Combine numbers in a year. Character, you will not. John Tortorella, my coach in Tampa, did not remember how much I bench-pressed. He remembered who showed up early for the next practice.
Second: your draft position is just a gateway. Craig Ramsay, who won the Stanley Cup with Tampa as an assistant in 2004 and later coached the Slovak national team for eight years, until 2025, told me a sentence I still remember today: "In five years, no one will ask you in which round you were drafted. They will ask what you did after that." [12]
Third: a European in the NHL must be coachable. Not submissive, coachable. He must know how to listen, process feedback and show the next day that he has applied it. A stationary bike does not test this. Interviews do, and most guys do not even know it.
VI / Prediction: Top 5 European Draft Order
Where I think these five Europeans will end up on June 26 in Buffalo.
This is my prediction based on 30 years in hockey and on data, but it is no guarantee. The draft has its own dynamics.
| Name | CS # | My prediction | Comment |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ivar Stenberg | 1 | #1 overall | Toronto will take Stenberg. The surest European pick in the draft. |
| Alberts Smits | 2 | #5-7 | The Combine will push him higher. Olympic experience + size + mobility = a rare combination. |
| Viggo Bjorck | 4 | #10-14 | Depends on Combine results. If physical metrics do not surprise, he falls to the middle of the first round. |
| Oliver Suvanto | 3 | #12-16 | Defensive center in Liiga at age 17. A team looking for a Bergeron-type player will find him. |
| Elton Hermansson | 5 | #14-20 | The widest range. He could go 14th or 22nd; it depends on the interview. |
Those 6 days in Buffalo are not just about hockey. It is the only time when analytics are just as important as a scout's eye. Anyone who does not have their analytics there is wasting a year.
VII / Final thoughts and a challenge
The draft is all about one thing: who sees what others do not.
In less than a month, on June 26, 2026, the draft will begin at the KeyBank Center in Buffalo. [1] Toronto will call Stenberg's name. And then it begins: 32 teams, each with its own rankings, each with its own data. And each with a single question: which of these boys will be playing in the NHL in three years, and who will fall by the wayside?
It will be the same building where Tampa Bay selected a kid from Liptovsky Mikulas as the 252nd overall pick in 1998. [12, 15] Back then, almost no one saw him. Today, scouts see almost everyone, and that makes what lies hidden behind the numbers all the more important.
The answer is not in the Combine numbers. It is not in the VO2max or the Wingate test. It is in what that kid does when he wakes up a year from now in Providence, Laval or Bakersfield and has a choice: to get on the ice an hour early, or to go back to bed.
The draft is about one thing: who sees what others do not. In 1998, almost no one in Buffalo saw it. In 2026, every team has the data, the eye and the budget, and yet some of those 90 names will not be playing in the NHL three years from now. The difference between the surprise of the year and a warning that no one listened to will not be decided this week on a stationary bike. It will be decided in the morning, a year from now, when no one is watching.
And there is another quiet trend. The NHL salary cap is rising to $104 million in the 2026-27 season and to $113.5 million in 2027-28, and for the first time in the cap era, a single player could earn over $20 million. [13] More money in the system means clubs are more willing to invest in development and analytics outside the cap. Pat Verbeek quadrupled Anaheim's analytics department from one to four people in a single offseason. ESPN summed it up in 2022 with the headline "There's no salary cap on hockey operations." [14] This is a new market, and Europe does not yet have a place in it.
Martin Cibak
2004 Stanley Cup Champion, Tampa Bay Lightning
CIBAK HOCKEY IQ co-founder and Chief Hockey Officer
Sources
- NHL.com / Buffalo Sabres, Buffalo to host the 2026 NHL Draft; Combine at LECOM Harborcenter (May 31-June 6, 2026), Draft at KeyBank Center (June 26-27, 2026). https://www.nhl.com/sabres/news/buffalo-sabres-to-host-2026-nhl-draft
- NHL.com, "McKenna, Stenberg among 90 draft prospects attending NHL Scouting Combine" (list of invitees, testing protocols: VO2max, Wingate, force-plate, 10-meter sprint, isokinetic squat, medical exams, interviews). https://www.nhl.com/news/topic/nhl-draft/mckenna-stenberg-among-top-draft-prospects-at-2026-nhl-scouting-combine
- NHL.com, the Toronto Maple Leafs won the 2026 draft lottery (8.5%, 1st overall pick). https://www.nhl.com/news/toronto-maple-leafs-win-2026-nhl-draft-lottery
- NHL.com / ESPN, Gavin McKenna (Penn State), 51 points (15+36) in 35 NCAA games; consensus No. 1 pick in the 2026 draft. https://www.espn.com/nhl/story/_/id/48666667/2026-nhl-draft-rankings-top-prospects
- NHL.com, NHL Central Scouting Final Rankings, International & North American Skaters (May 2026); profiles of Stenberg, Smits, Suvanto, Bjorck, Hermansson, Klepov. https://www.nhl.com/news/final-central-scouting-2026-international-draft-rankings-released
- Daily Faceoff, "Meet Alberts Smits, the no-nonsense top NHL prospect from Latvia" (2026). https://www.dailyfaceoff.com/news/who-is-alberts-smits-latvias-best-nhl-draft-prospect-ever-2026-world-juniors
- The Hockey Writers / The Hockey News, Elton Hermansson 2026 NHL Draft Prospect Profile (21 points in 38 games in the Allsvenskan; Hlinka Gretzky Cup 11 points / 5 goals). https://thehockeywriters.com/elton-hermansson-2026-nhl-draft-prospect-profile/
- McKeen's Hockey / The Hockey Writers, Oliver Suvanto 2026 NHL Draft Profile (Tappara, Liiga, 11 points in 48 games). https://thehockeywriters.com/oliver-suvanto-2026-nhl-draft-profile/
- The Hockey Writers, 2026 NHL Draft Guide (Oscar Hemming, mid-season transfer to Boston College). https://thehockeywriters.com/2026-nhl-draft-guide/
- Patrick Bacon / Top Down Hockey, NHL Equivalency and Prospect Projection Models (NHLe; KHL factor ~0.73). https://medium.com/data-science/nhl-equivalency-and-prospect-projection-models-6f275a45e22
- Model 284 / Thibaud Chatel, Hockey League Translation Factors: methodology and comparison of models. https://model284.com/hockey-league-translation-factors-methodology/
- Hockey-Reference, Martin Cibak: Tampa Bay Lightning, 1998 NHL Draft, 9th round, 252nd overall; 2004 Stanley Cup. https://www.hockey-reference.com/players/c/cibakma01.html
- NHL.com / NHLPA, NHL salary cap: $104 million (2026-27), $113.5 million (2027-28). https://www.nhl.com/news/nhl-nhlpa-announce-team-payroll-ranges-for-next-3-seasons
- ESPN (2022), "There's no salary cap on hockey operations" (Pat Verbeek, Anaheim Ducks; analytics department 1 to 4). https://www.espn.com/nhl/story/_/id/34277672/there-no-salary-cap-hockey-operations
- Wikipedia / CBS Sports, history of the NHL Scouting Combine: first edition in 1994 in Toronto, moved to Buffalo in 2015; the 1998 NHL Draft was held in Buffalo (Marine Midland Arena, now KeyBank Center). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NHL_draft_combine
Every numerical and factual data point in the text has been verified against official sources (NHL.com, NHL Central Scouting, Hockey-Reference). The NHL Scouting Combine in its modern form was established in 1994 in Toronto and moved to Buffalo in 2015; in 1998, the NHL Draft was held in Buffalo, not the Combine. NHLe conversion factors and the failure rate of KHL imports are presented as indicative analytical estimates, not as official statistics.