With the Philadelphia Flyers’ regular season fortunately coming to a close soon, the final days of March going into April is an exciting time for team-related prospects as well as NCAA free agents.
It’s not expected to be a deep class of prospects to choose from but the Flyers have been linked to Michigan State forward Karsen Dorwart, as originally reported by Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman in his “32 Thoughts” column on March 20th.
“Michigan State is expected to be the No. 1 seed in the upcoming NCAA tournament. Karsen Dorwart, their second-leading scorer behind Tampa’s Isaac Howard, nearly went to the Maple Leafs one year ago, but returned to school. Several teams suspect Philadelphia lusts after him like an Angelo’s cheesesteak.”
Dorwart steps in as a 22-year-old centre out of Sherwood, Oregon, stands at 6’1”’and around 195 pounds, and has spent the previous three seasons with Michigan State University in the Big Ten.
Coming out of Sioux Falls of the USHL in 2021-22, Dorwart collected just 9 goals and 25 points in 61 games before moving on to Michigan State, where he displayed brilliance with 10 goals and 27 points in 38 games as a freshman. He followed that up with 35 points in 38 games last year and 29 points in 34 games this season.
Michigan State led the Big Ten standings in the regular season. They and Minnesota both had 50 points on the season but the Spartans held the slight edge with a 15-5-4 conference record compared to Minnesota at 15-6-3.
Offensively, they are paced by Tampa Bay Lighting first-round pick Isaac Howard who has 26 goals and 51 points with Dorwart behind him at 29 points. While his numbers might leave a lot to be desired, the scouts have had a lot of good things to say, including Steven Ellis of Daily Faceoff.
“I’ll start with Karsen Dorwart out of Michigan State. This guy is probably the best two-way center of any of the college free agents there. He really controls the puck well. I saw him a couple times in person this year, and it felt like he was just involved at both ends of the ice. He’s not going to be a high-end producer, pretty much at any level, but I think he’s got the hockey sense and that defensive responsibility that you can plug and play him in different spots, and he’s going to perform.”
Dorwart won’t blow the doors off their hinges with his offensive production but he’s a very good two-way centreman who can play both sides of the puck. That description will sound awfully familiar to Flyers fans because that’s the type of player they’ve been drafting and scouting since the time of Ron Hextall.
However, considering the Flyers’ immense lack of depth at the centre position in all facets of the organization, attempting to lure Dorwart does them absolutely no harm and gives them another young player to add to the core.
At the NHL level, the Flyers have Sean Couturier, Noah Cates, Ryan Poehling, and Rodrigo Ābols, the Lehigh Valley Phantoms have Jacob Gaucher and Anthony Richard, and the pipeline is headlined by Jett Luchanko and Jack Berglund but not much else.
Adding Dorwart to the mix gives the Flyers a young able-bodied centre who might already be a better option than some of the aforementioned players in the organization.
With Michigan State featuring in the NCAA men’s hockey tournament with a chance to make the Frozen Four, we won’t hear about Dorwart’s free agent status until perhaps midway through the month of April, depending on how far they go.
The Spartans are the #2 overall seed in the tournament and their first game comes against Cornell on Thursday in the second of two semifinals contests within the Toledo Regional. Boston University will go toe-to-toe with Ohio State in the other semifinals matchup with the regional finals taking place on Saturday.
After that, the winners from Toledo, Manchester, Fargo, and Allentown will feature in the Frozen Four, which begins on the 10th of April.
Flyers prospects Alex Bump (Western Michigan) and Devin Kaplan (Boston University) will be taking part in the tournament as well. Bump’s Broncos will take on Minnesota in the Fargo Regional while Kaplan’s Terriers will face Ohio State in the Toledo Regional.
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