Q: Which player position was most commonly seen in the portal this offseason? How about year in school? Were there more sophomores? Juniors? Seniors? Etc.

A: As expected, the majority of portal entrants were forwards, about 53% of the entire portal. This was followed by defensemen (32%) and goaltenders (15%) - not surprising. As for year in school, this was a bit more intriguing as sophomores actually had the highest amount of portal entrants in 2025 with about 33% of the entire portal make-up. Freshmen followed closely behind at about 31%. Things drop off a little bit after that with juniors (26%) and then seniors (8%). Less than 3% of the entire portal was athletes listed as a redshirt freshman, sophomore or junior, or as a graduate student. This is definitely a bit different than what we have seen in the past. In 2024, the portal was mostly made up of seniors, followed by sophomores, so clearly the number of seniors has dropped off, which could easily be due to a lack of Covid-19 extra eligibility now in current college-aged athletes, but the number of sophomores has stayed pretty consistently high this offseason.

You can view the charts for these numbers below.

Q: How many draft picks were in the portal? Were they big-name prospects?

A: As always, there are a handful of draft picks to be found in the transfer portal. To be honest though, most of these skaters and goaltenders are athletes that have not found the success that they might have wanted in their collegiate careers thus far and many are transferring to try something new.

There were 30 total players in the portal this offseason who have had their names called at the NHL Draft. Almost all of them are skaters who are fourth to seventh round picks but there were a few higher selections to be found as well, such as first-round pick Sacha Boisvert (North Dakota -> Boston University) and second-round pick defenders Colin Ralph (St. Cloud State -> Michigan State) and Brady Cleveland (Wisconsin -> Colorado College -> Minn. Duluth). This number of 30 is slightly lower than the amount from the portal last year (36). You can view a list of all the drafted players in the portal in 2025 below.

Q: Where do these transfer portal players originally from? Are there more from one state or another? How many countries are represented?

A: Close to 60% of portal entrants are originally from the United States. About 30% are from Canada. The remaining 10% are those from various countries in Europe.

While looking at the most common home states in the portal, Minnesota comes out on top by a fairly large margin, followed by Michigan, New York, Illinois and Massachusetts, respectively. There were 26 total states represented.

There were 7 provinces represented in the portal this year, with Ontario having the most representation, followed by Alberta and British Columbia.

For the other non-North American countries, Sweden had the most athletes in the portal (15) but there were players from Belarus, Finland, Latvia, Norway, Russia, Slovakia, and Switzerland all seen on the list this offseason.

Q: When looking at the portal, how many athletes stayed in Division I and how many had to drop down to USports / Division III / etc. or didn’t find a new home at all whatsoever?

A: Out of the 311 transfer portal entrants, almost all of them found a new home to play hockey. Only about *5% are not currently playing hockey anywhere that we could find statistics of. Over half of the athletes who didn’t wind up anywhere in 2025-26 were seniors/grad students who were likely just trying to see what there options were before possibly deciding on their future job/life situations. (see list of these athletes below)

*The day that this story was published, it was announced that Cullen DeYoung (listed below - formerly of Sacred Heart) is joining the Vermont roster for the second half of the season, so he is back playing hockey again after not playing anywhere during the first half.

About 9% of portal entrants ended up in USports this season. Interestingly enough, all of these athletes are Canadian (well, Wolfgang Govedaris lists his home state as Florida but it looks like he’s a dual USA/CAN citizen). It seems like Americans more so tend to drop down to Division III instead of USports. About 12% of total portal entrants wound up in Division III. '

USports schools that players wound up at (16 different places): York, Western Ontario, Toronto, New Brunswick, Manitoba, Guelph, Calgary, Alberta, British Columbia, Toronto Metropolitan, St. Francis Xavier, Queen’s, Mount Royal, McGill, MacEwan, Carleton.

Division III schools that players wound up at (23 different places): Augsburg, Wisconsin-River Falls, Western New England, Utica, UMass-Boston, Tufts, Trinity, Trine, SUNY-Geneseo, Wisconsin-Stevens Point, St. Norbert, SUNY-Oswego, New England, Middlebury, Hobart, Hamilton, Gustavus Adolphus, Endicott, Curry, Colby, Chatham, Aurora, Adrian.

Some athletes decided instead to join hockey at the club/ACHA level. This was only 5 players in the entire portal. One stayed at their current Division I school but just dropped down to the club level, while the other four transferred to Arkansas, Oklahoma State, the University of Arizona and Liberty.

There was also a small portion of players who opted to sign low level professional deals instead of choose a new school. This accounted for about 4% of players in the portal. Most of them wound up in Sweden but some of them ended up in the ECHL, the AlpsHL, the SPHL, in Germany, Norway or Slovakia.

Another very small number of athletes returned to junior hockey in 2025-26. This was only three players. One went to the WHL, one went to the OHL and one went to the USHL. Obviously, that is not an option for most college athletes due to age restrictions/eligibility.

One more interesting statistics is that there were about 10 players who withdrew their names from the portal and wound up returning to their original Division I program in 2025-26. Not a large number, but it happens.

Q: Which schools had the most (and the least) athletes enter the portal in 2025?

A: This year, the program with the most transfer portal entrants was far and away American International College (23). This isn’t surprising though considering that they school decided to cut the men’s Division I hockey program, so all of its athletes that wanted to continue playing at the DI level had to try and find a new team for 2025-26.

Aside from them, Northern Michigan had a large amount (12), followed by Miami (11), Merrimack and Alaska Fairbanks (10 each). Other schools that had quite a few were RPI (9), Long Island (9) and Nebraska Omaha (9). Most of these schools either underwent a coaching change this past year or the year before so it’s not very surprising that a few of these programs are seeing large amounts of turnover.

On the flip side, there were a handful of schools that had absolutely no one enter the portal in 2025. This includes Minnesota, Notre Dame, Augustana, Dartmouth and Boston College. Schools that had just one portal entrant include Air Force, Army West Point, Bemidji State, Holy Cross, Penn State, Princeton, St. Lawrence, and Yale.

Q: Which schools recruited the most (and the least) out of the transfer portal?

A: Ferris State recruited the most out of the transfer portal this year with 13. That’s not very surprising when you consider that there was a coaching change there and that head coach Brett Riley brought five of his previous skaters from Long Island to the Bulldogs with him. That also explains Long Island’s fairly high number of portal entrants this season as well.

Other schools who used the portal a lot in rounding out their 2025-26 rosters are RPI (11), Minnesota State (10), Northern Michigan (8), Canisius (8) and Miami (7).

There were plenty of schools that didn’t use the portal at all in recruiting this offseason, which includes Air Force, Army West Point, Yale, Princeton, Dartmouth, Harvard, UConn, Nebraska Omaha and Denver. It’s not surprising when Army, Air Force, and the Ivy League schools don’t use the portal much considering that it would be extremely difficult to transfer into these programs.

Dartmouth was the only school in 2025 to not have any enter the portal AND to not recruit anyone out of the portal. They are portal neutral.

Q: There is a lot of talk about players who have transferred multiple times - how many athletes in the portal this year have already been in the portal before?

A: That’s a great question. We are starting to see more and more ‘double-dippers’ and even ‘triple-dippers’ into the transfer portal. These accounts for about 31 athletes in the portal this year, or about 10%. There were a handful of athletes that could’ve made this number even larger but they instead decided to sign a low-level professional deal or they simply hung up the skates altogether in 2025-26. You can view a list of these double and triple-dippers below and which schools they have gone to.

Triple-Dippers in the Portal

• Chase Clark: Quinnipiac -> Sacred Heart -> AIC -> Canisius

• Blake Dangos: Arizona State -> Sacred Heart -> AIC -> Long Island

Double-Dippers in the Portal

• Tyler Haskins (Denver -> Minnesota State -> Mercyhurst)

• Nicholas Niemo (Bentley -> Maine -> Niagara)

• Ray Fust (Nebraska Omaha -> Clarkson -> Sacred Heart)

• Noah Ellis (UMass -> Nebraska Omaha -> Sacred Heart)

• Evan Werner (Colorado College -> Michigan -> Notre Dame)

• Cole Burtch (Western Michigan -> Ferris State -> Augustana)

• Carter Rapalje (Stonehill -> Long Island -> Ferris State)

• Caden Brown (Wisconsin -> Ohio State -> Ferris State)

• Jack Mesic (Ferris State -> Western Michigan -> Ferris State)

• Owen Bartoszkiewicz (Minnesota -> Lindenwood -> Michigan Tech)

• Tristan Lemyre (Denver -> Western Michigan -> Minnesota State)

• Kyler Kleven (Minnesota Duluth -> Niagara -> Augsburg)

• Keenan Rancier (Minnesota State -> Vermont -> Clarkson)

• Will Gilson (Alaska Anchorage -> RPI -> Quinnipiac)

• Jack Babbage (Quinnipiac -> New Hampshire -> St. Lawrence)

• Matthew Campbell (Quinnipiac -> Michigan Tech -> Merrimack)

• Dylan Gratton (Penn State -> Nebraska Omaha -> Vermont)

• Luke Johnson (Minnesota Duluth -> Alaska Fairbanks -> Alaska Anchorage)

• Noah Serdachny (Colorado College -> AIC -> Long Island)

• Nate Benoit (North Dakota -> Quinnipiac -> Long Island)

• David Posma (Niagara -> AIC -> Stonehill)

• Matthew Romer (Arizona State -> Northern Michigan -> Stonehill)

• Max Helgeson (Lindenwood -> Alaska Anchorage -> Miami)

• Brady Cleveland (Wisconsin -> Colorado College -> Minnesota Duluth)

• Will Whitelaw (Wisconsin -> Michigan -> Western Michigan)

• Brett Bamber (Alaska Anchorage -> AIC -> MacEwan)

• Ethan Barwick (Lindenwood -> Northern Michigan -> Univ. of Alberta)

• Dawson Smith (Western Michigan -> Robert Morris -> York)

• Michael Citara (Providence -> Merrimack -> Alaska Fairbanks)

Q: Who are some of the best players that were in the transfer portal this year / who were some of the biggest surprises?

A: Well, you could say Sacha Boisvert if you are just simply looking at drafted prospects since he was the only first round pick in the portal this offseason, but there are plenty of other portal pickups that have made waves so far this winter.

Three drafted prospects who have been very good for their teams currently are Sutter Muzzatti, Trevor Hoskin and Will Whitelaw. Muzzatti (RPI -> Notre Dame) is tied for the lead in scoring for the Fighting Irish with 15pts thru 16gp. Hoskin (formerly of Niagara) leads Merrimack in scoring with 17pts in 16gp. Whitelaw is tied for the lead in scoring for the reigning national champions in Western Michigan with 15pts in 16gp.

Here’s some non-drafted prospects who transferred this last year who are currently leading their teams in scoring as well… Brett Rylance (AIC -> Long Island), Michael Citara (Merrimack -> Alaska Fairbanks), Josh Zary (Long Island -> Ferris State), Matteo Giampa (Canisius -> Miami), Tristan Lemyre (Western Michigan -> Minnesota State), Caiden Gault (Ferris State -> Northern Michigan), Ryan Taylor (Clarkson -> Robert Morris), Alex Gaffney (Harvard -> St. Thomas), Matthew Romer (Northern Michigan -> Stonehill), Luc Wilson (Minnesota State -> RPI) and Tyler Dunbar (Colorado College -> Union).

And there are plenty of other guys you could talk about too that are also doing well, like Adam Eisele (Minnesota State -> Ohio State), Evan Werner (Michigan -> Notre Dame), Jayden Perron (North Dakota -> Michigan), Ben Robertson (Cornell -> Michigan), Owen McLaughlin (North Dakota -> Boston Univ.), Walter Zacher (Robert Morris -> Canisius), Isaiah Norlin (Nebraska Omaha -> Colgate), and so many more.

And just to touch on goalies who have thrived, I’m not sure if anyone has done better than Lawton Zacher. The transfer from Brown has thrived at Northeastern and a .936 save percentage through 13 games, including three shutouts and a 1.92 GAA. A few other notable netminders include Connor Hasley (Bentley -> Arizona State) and Owen Bartoszkiewicz (Lindenwood -> Michigan Tech), among plenty of others.

In general, after going through the list of players, it seems like a large majority of players are doing at least the same or better at their new schools than at their previous programs. There are obviously some athletes who are doing worse this season (statistically or having less playing time) but those skaters are in the minority. This isn’t surprising since most players are clearly transferring for better opportunities / more playing time in the first place.

Q: Were there any trends to be seen with the amount of players entering and leaving a certain conference?

A: Yes and no. It’s hard to tell any specific trends with a sample size of this amount but you can still calculate a few averages.

For the average amount of portal entrants per conference, I took the total amount of players leaving a conference and divided it by the number of schools in that conference to get an average number (rounded to the first decimal place). On average, Independent schools had the most portal entrants per school, on average, followed by the NCHC. It’s not surprising that the Indie’s had the highest amount considering that has almost always been a pattern in the portal. For the lowest of average portal entrants, it was the Big 10 and the ECAC who had the least.

For the average amount of portal additions to each conference, the CCHA and the Independent schools tended to add the most roster additions from the portal, on average. Meanwhile, Hockey East, the ECAC and the Big 10 all had the lowest amounts of portal roster additions in 2025-26.

Overall, when looking at common destinations for players from each conference, there were a few trends to be seen. Players from Atlantic Hockey America had a high amount of athletes who dropped down to Division III and to USports, but staying in AHA or transferring to Independent schools were a popular option. The CCHA also had a high number of USports and Division III transfers but staying in the CCHA was a popular option too. Skaters from the ECAC tended to transfer the most to Atlantic Hockey. Those from Independent schools mostly stayed Independent or transferred to the CCHA. Meanwhile, those in the NCHC also mostly stayed within the NCHC - or the CCHA was a popular destination as well. There weren’t any real trends that I could see for Big 10 athletes or Hockey East athletes, they all kind of went all over.

Q: How many players in the portal were impact players for their previous teams in 2024-25?

A: Honestly, not that many. While going through the list and keeping track of all the skaters who had at least 10 points or more last season or were the starting goaltender for a chunk of time for their teams, these athletes accounted between 25 and 30% of the overall player pool in the portal. The rest of the portal is players who had less than 10 points last season or were goaltenders who didn’t see the ice much. So stay calm and don’t panic too much because although the college hockey landscape is changing day by day the parity in college hockey is still better than ever right now and we will see how things change this season with the transfer portal in 2026.

The men’s and women’s transfer portal spreadsheets will be available this spring on APX Hockey.

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