If there’s one person in the Calgary Flames organization that’s owed a bit of a respite from rough injury luck, it’s 2023 first-round pick Sam Honzek.

A product of Trenin, Slovakia, Honzek was limited to 43 games in 2022-23 – his draft year – after suffering a skate cut during the World Juniors. In 2023-24, he suffered an abdominal injury in his final NHL pre-season game, which kept him out of Western League action until December. Later on, he suffered a facial injury and played several weeks wearing a protective bubble. He made the Flames’ NHL roster out of training camp in 2024-25, but was clobbered by a hit from Chicago defenceman Connor Murphy and returned to the AHL when he was cleared for action.

In 2024-25, Honzek seemed good enough to make the NHL but seemed to have a tough time finding a clear role once he got there. He played five games with the Flames to open the season and he was… fine! It’s hard to poke holes in his performance, but there wasn’t enough to be enthusiastic about either. He was fine. When he joined the Wranglers a few months into the season, he was moved around a bit as the Wranglers’ coaching staff tried to figure out where he fit. He played power play. He played penalty kill. When some players were called up and/or injured late in the season, he was tried a bit at centre, too.

As a late birthday, Honzek’s contract slid in 2024-25 – he got a full year of pro development, more or less, but his entry-level deal didn’t toll. So if he could take some of his lessons from the season and use them over the summer and into 2025-26, that would be a bonus.

Alright, good news and bad news, gang.

The bad news first: Honzek did not avoid the injury ninja in 2025-26, and in fact he was hurt in November on a fluke collision with Flames captain Mikael Backlund and missed the rest of the season, as his injury required surgery.

The good news is that Honzek made the Flames roster out of training camp for the second consecutive season, in no small part due to fitness adjustments he made after his first pro season. And unlike 2024-25, where he was perfectly fine, Honzek was quietly quite good in 2025-26. He was actually cut during training camp, but he was called back up shortly afterwards due to late-camp injuries to Martin Pospisil and Jonathan Huberdeau.

A few games into the year Honzek found himself playing on a line with Backlund and Blake Coleman. He visibly learned and adjusted as his 18 game run wore on, to the point where he was a regular on the penalty kill and was starting to find ways to generate offensive opportunities for his line… while playing on the shutdown trio against the other team’s best and brightest.

You never want to see anyone get hurt, but Honzek had a ton of positive progression before he was knocked out for the year.

Over the past two years, we’ve seen Honzek make the NHL roster twice. This past season, we saw his game find its identity and him start to carve out a spot for himself on an NHL roster in a key role. The big challenge for him in 2026-27: do it again… and find a way to play a full, injury-free season in the process.

Honzek has a ton of great tools in his repertoire. He seems to be figuring out how to use them to the maximize his potential.