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Should the Flames select Keaton Verhoeff in the first round?
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Photo credit: Sergei Belski-USA TODAY Sports
Ryan Pike
Feb 25, 2026, 14:30 ESTUpdated: Feb 25, 2026, 00:00 EST
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Gang, it’s becoming pretty likely that the Calgary Flames will select high in the upcoming 2026 NHL Draft.
As the season has wore on, we’ve started to take a look at some of the players near the top of the rankings for this year’s draft. And there are a few really impressive prospects, all with different profiles and strengths, that could be available when the Flames select.
With that in mind, let’s take a look at highly-touted defenceman Keaton Verhoeff.

The scouting report

A product of Fort Saskatchewan, Alberta – an Edmonton suburb – Verhoeff is a right shot defenceman listed at 6’4″ and 212 pounds. He’s a June 2008 birthday, and he celebrates his 18th birthday the week before the draft.
The fourth overall pick in the 2023 WHL Prospects Draft, Verhoeff ended up playing a dozen games in 2023-24 as a 15-year-old with the Victoria Royals. He joined the Royals full-time in 2023-24 for his 16-year-old season and he impressed as a rookie. He was tied for 23rd in the Dub in points by a blueliner despite being one of the youngest regular players in the league.
He opted to head to the NCAA for his 17-year-old season, 2025-26, joining the University of North Dakota as an under-aged freshman. He’s had a pretty effective freshman season as the only under-18 blueliner in the league. The only under-19 defender in the NCAA with more points than Verhoeff is Penn State’s Jackson Smith.
Here’s Steven Ellis’ assessment of Verhoeff from his mid-season rankings in January:
Verhoeff has played some of his best hockey of the season since returning from the World Juniors. I thought he looked good for Canada, despite ice time being difficult to come by. What was especially important, though, was how he bounced back from a bad shift in a way so few his age can. He’s putting up excellent numbers with the University of North Dakota, and being mobile and 6-foot-4 doesn’t hurt. Some scouts think he’d be good enough for the pro game already. I still think he needs to focus on his defensive-zone play, but there isn’t a more rounded defender in this draft class, although the next two options might put up an argument.

The case for Keaton Verhoeff

For somebody so young, Verhoeff has played a lot of hockey and has become somebody the Flames have potentially learned a lot about:
  • He’s played at a bunch of high-end international events: the Under-17 Hockey Challenge, the Under-18 Worlds, the Hlinka Gretzky Cup and the World Juniors. He’s performed well at all of those events, too.
  • He played his hockey prior to heading to the WHL at Rink Academy Kelowna, the academy system where Jarome Iginla also coached.
  • He played at Victoria with Cole Reschny.
  • He plays at North Dakota with Reschny, Abram Wiebe and Cade Littler.
He’s not exactly a stranger.
He doesn’t have a huge sample size in any particular league – he’ll have one full WHL season and one full NCAA season under his belt when he’s drafted – but he played a lot in each league and played well. Projecting him may be a bit of a challenge based on smallish sample sizes, but it’s pretty obvious that he’s good – it may just be a matter of how good.

The case against Keaton Verhoeff

It seems like a dumb nitpick, but could Verhoeff reach his full potential in a system that’s already heavy on young right shot defenders? The Flames already have Zayne Parekh in the NHL, Hunter Brzustewicz in the AHL and Henry Mews in the NCAA. Can all of them be developed to their full potential if the Flames have to juggle the development of four high-end puck-movers?
I don’t think the Flames would downgrade Verhoeff as a player because of his position or handedness, though; they’re not going to pick a lesser player with their first pick just to avoid a positional logjam. If the four best players available are right-shot blueliners, you take them, develop them as players and as assets, and then make some decisions on which ones best fit your team going forward.
It’s easy to see why scouts are so high on Verhoeff based on his size, skills and how quickly he adapted his game to the WHL and NCAA in successive seasons. He’s appeared pretty consistently ranked between 2nd and 4th on most prominent public draft rankings.

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