HabsWorld.net -- 

Earlier this month, a pair of Habs received some end-of-season honours with Nick Suzuki and Cole Caufield taking home trophies.  Now, one of their prospects has received an end-of-season award with Adam Engstrom being named to the AHL 2025-26 Top Prospects Team.

The team is determined by the league’s hockey operations department and AHL General Managers.  Three forwards, two defencemen, and one goalie are picked with the projection of being the best future NHL players.  To qualify, skaters must have been 22 or younger at the start of the regular season and suited up in at least 36 AHL games and no more than 30 NHL games this season.

Engstrom played in 45 games with the Rocket this season, picking up 10 goals and 24 assists while being an all-situations player.  His performance earned him a pair of recalls to the Habs where he made it into his first 15 NHL contests where he logged over 13 minutes of ice time per game.  He was Montreal’s seventh defenceman to start the playoffs but was sent down when Noah Dobson returned; he then returned after Laval was ousted from the playoffs.

A third-round pick by the Canadiens back in 2022, Engstrom has quickly gone from a project to one of Montreal’s top defensive prospects.  His strong skating fits with today’s quicker game and his ability to comfortably play both sides on the back end makes him more valuable as a prospect.  He could plausibly make a run at a roster spot with Montreal in training camp (if not traded this offseason) but failing that, he has one year left on his entry-level deal and one season of waiver exemption remaining.

It’s the second season in a row that one of Laval’s defencemen was on this end-of-season team.  Last year, it was Logan Mailloux, who then was traded to St. Louis last summer.  They are the only two Montreal prospects to be named to this team since it was created back in the 2022-23 campaign.

The other players selected to the team were goaltender Sergei Murashov, (Wilkes-Barre/Scranton), defenceman Carter Yakemchuk (Belleville), plus forwards Michael Brandsegg-Nygard (Grand Rapids), Konsta Helenius (Rochester), and Ilya Protas (Hershey).