Flames Top 25 Under 25: #1 - Matthew Tkachuk

#1 - Matthew Tkachuk

Position: Left Wing

Age: 21

Team: Calgary Flames (NHL)

Drafted in 2016, Round 1, Pick 6

Last Year’s Ranking: #3

While his contract status remains up in the air, Matthew Tkachuk has topped our annual Top 25 Under 25 rankings and is the first player not named Johnny Gaudreau to do so in over five years.

Prior to this year, Tkachuk had been known league-wide mainly as a s*** distruber and one of the biggest pests in the league, but his offensive abilities were somewhat a secret outside of Calgary. Well, that’s no longer the case as Tkachuk broke out with 34 goals and 77 points in 80 games this year, smashing his career highs in goals, assists, and points. It was a huge step forward for Tkachuk as he even made his way into the NHL’s Top 20 Wingers list.

It’s hard to get too far into an article about Tkachuk before bringing up his contract negotiations and that he remains an RFA as we move into the latter half of August. With multiple young NHL stars still awaiting contracts, I’m not as worried as I may have been in past years with less of precedent being set of negotiations dragging late into the summer.

Tkachuk will undoubtedly come in as the new highest paid player on the Flames and with that will come a lot of expectations from himself, the team, and the fanbase. He hasn’t had an issue living up to and surpassing expectations before, and now we wait to see if he can do it again.