2025 NHL Draft Profile: Carter Amico

Back in 2012, the Maple Leafs drafted Morgan Rielly with the 5th overall pick. He had a lot of hype going into the season, but missed most of it because of a knee injury that limited him to 23 games between the regular season and playoffs. There's a lot of lore (some real, some exaggerated) around the idea that Rielly would have gone first overall if he hadn't missed so much time because of it. He had the benefit of returning before the end of the season.What's noteworthy about that, is his draft position fell all of four spots – from this hypothetical first overall, to fifth.

What happens when a prospect in his draft year misses even more time – playing only 19 combined games – and wasn't considered as much of a clear-cut top prospect? That's what we'll find out with Carter Amico.

THE BASICS: STATS AND CONTEXT

• Position: Right-shot defenseman
• League(s): USHL/US NTDP
• Height: 6'5"
• Weight: 232 lbs
• Birthdate: March 15th, 2007

Here are his draft rankings, as of writing this:

• Bob McKenzie: 47th
• Corey Pronman: 75th
• Will Scouch: Honourable mention
• Elite Prospects: 62nd
• Scott Wheeler: 65th
• Dobber Prospects: 43rd
• FC Hockey: 51st
• McKeen's Hockey: 39th
• HockeyProspect.com: 23rd

Amico's current rankings seems pretty normal for someone who could be taken in Toronto's range, but he had a lot more hype early in the year. He didn't appear in Bob McKenzie's first ranking in September which covered his 20 prospects. But these rankings were released just before Amico's season began, and once it did he quickly gained a lot of first-round hype – Elite Prospects had him 22nd, HockeyProspect.com at 23rd, Dobber Prospects at 27th, and Scott Wheeler had him as an honourable mention just outside his top 32.

Unfortunately for Amico, he suffered a season ending knee injury in early November, and I've been seeing his draft rankings slowly slip from there. Some, like HockeyProspect.com, still have him pretty high but only because they haven't updated their rankings in months. By now, virtually every outlet has him no higher than the second round, including Bob McKenzie and Corey Pronman, who are the best indications on what actual NHL teams are thinking.

Of course, as a result of the injury, there really isn't much to break down as far as Amico's season is concerned. He played for the US National Development Program, which is a sign that he was already considered to be one of the top defense prospects out of America in his age group. He was not used as one of the top defenseman on the NTDP, however, mostly playing on the second pair from what I can tell. He played a lot of penalty kill and holding leads late in the game, but no powerplay time that I saw and not when they needed goals late in the game.

So on the one hand, you can see 6 points (all assists) in 19 games and safely assume that Amico isn't that much of an offensive defenseman. On the other, you can also say he could get more if had more of an offensive role. On the other other hand, having watched a few of his games at the start of the year, I can understand why he wasn't given as big an offensive role.

So, what is it about Amico that still had scouts so interested with so few games played at the start of the season?

THE GOOD: ELITE SIZE, SKATING AND DEFENSE

The first and most obvious elements of Amico's game that stands out is his combination of size, strength, and skating – and how that combination impacts his defense. At 6'5" and 234 lbs he is one of the biggest defensemen in the draft, and between his reach and skating he can cover a lot of ground. I wouldn't say he's an elite skater, but he doesn't necessarily need to be and he will very likely improve with time and development.

In fact, Amico's abilities as a defender are noted by every scout. He uses that size and reach to disrupt puck carriers coming at him on the rush, and on sustained possessions in the defensive zone. He is a very physically aggressive defenseman, with a willingness to use his size to throw pretty thunderous hits to his advantage. He can chase hits at time, but not to a ridiculous extent. He uses it more to take players out of a play, separate them from the puck, and honestly you can see opposing players avoiding him and his side of the ice. This blend of size, reach, and physicality is why so many scouts consider him to have significant defensive upside.

Let's talk a bit more about his skating. Amico's skating ability forms a large basis for his strength in defending and offensive potential. Weirdly I think he is almost better skating backwards than forwards, which is great for his rush defense. He has a smooth stride with power behind it, he's balanced on his edges and is smooth in his pivots between forward and backward skating and changes in direction. Additionally, his hockey sense was noted as having made an improvement from last season to the start of this one before he was injured.

I wouldn't say that Amico is a high end skater, I would say it is "only" above average overall. He could stand to improve his overall mobility in terms of explosiveness, the quickness of his pivots, and other little areas of skating that will require further refinement to optimize his effectiveness at higher speeds. But I can safely say I don't think skating is at all a limitation for him, as you can often see with big defenseman who can look like Bambi on the ice.

But the other important element of his skating is how it impacts his ability to get the puck out, along with his passing. While neither are at an elite level, the combination is already at a pretty good level and shows flashes of being more high-end. Right now I would say he can pretty consistently make a good decision or reaction with the puck even when pressured. It could be protecting the puck and taking a hit to be able to safely skate away with it, it could be making a quick pass to his partner who isn't under pressure, it could be making a more clever pass up to a forward to start a rush attack. He can make the odd mistake or show poor accuracy with his passing, but that doesn't happen so frequently that it seems like a problem even now.

On the offensive side of the puck, I've seen some flashes from Amico but nothing that high-level or that consistent. He showcases flashes of deft puck-handling skills and the ability to evade pressure, that kind of thing he shows the most on starting breakouts. He does occasionally activate offensively to jump into the rush or supporting the cycle in the offensive zone. Again, this was not consistent and represents areas where further development and confidence-building are necessary to unlock a more reliable offensive dimension to his game.

The thing is, the big question is how much better he may have gotten if he played the full season. It's not at all uncommon to see players of his type who look to have the brain for seeing what they can do and just not being physically caught up enough to pull it off consistently. Danford showed a lot of improvement in this area last year, as an example, and even more this season. So while he's already physically mature in terms of his height and weight, his coordination may still be playing catch up. That's the hope for where his big improvements will come from. He likely won't become a high-end offensive defenseman, but he doesn't need to be with his tools. With his size, skating, and puck movement potential he could become a very solid two-way defenseman.

THE FLAWS: OFFENSE AND PUCK MOVEMENT

So the fact that Amico missed time this year is a double-edged sword. On the one hand, you can dream of potential he still can realize once he's back on the ice. On the other, this season is such an important year for development in terms of typical aging curves. He may catch up to some extent, but some of it could also just be lost forever. So the setback has not only limited the sample size of his play available for scouting but has also curtailed a crucial year of development that would have allowed for further assessment of his progression and potential. It's just a big element of uncertainty around him as a player and how good he is right now, and makes it even harder to project him in the future.

For example, there are a few aspects of Amico's game that seem very raw. I touched on those skating mechanics that would need to be smoothed out, but there's also those elements of physical coordination that he still needs in order to execute more consistently on those higher level plays. That would clean up a lot of his turnovers and unlock more of his skating ability, which as I've said is vital to all of his strengths.

The other things that will need improvement... some scouts have called out the mechanics in his skating related to weight transfers and pivots. His defense can have consistency issues related to him just suddenly being too passive, like giving a big gap on rushes coming at him or just kind of floating around the net without guarding a man or being in a shooting/passing lane to block it. None of these are major issues, but are all things that will help his overall game a lot.

OVERALL ASSESSMENT

While Amico's season-ending injury is undeniably a source of uncertainty, which is not something teams like when making their top draft choice, I still think there are good reasons to take him. He may be one of the more realistic prospects who could fall to Toronto and be a big upside swing that could provide an impact beyond what you'd expect from a late second rounder.

He's also a type of player that Toronto seems to really like under Treliving: a big, surprisingly fluid skating defenseman with a physical and defensively inclined game. Scouts consistently love his reach, strength, and willingness to crush dudes, with a potentially significant defensive upside. Though his offensive potential seems more limited, he has shown flashes of puck-handling ability and breakout-driving skill that could make him a very valuable two-way defenseman.

Amico will definitely be more of a long-term project, but with a potentially high ceiling. He is committed to Boston University in the NCAA, one of the better programs in college for churning out defensemen like Lane and Cole Hutson, Tom Willander, our own Cade Webber, Alex Vlasic of the Blackhawks, and Dante Fabbro.

Mind you, if I'm thinking this I'm sure other NHL teams will be. Amico's type is not just something Toronto likes, but is very commonly coveted by virtually every NHL team. There are several of them who have multiple picks before Toronto has one, and I think they'd be even more likely to take a gamble on Amico if they take one or more "sure things" already.

Thanks for reading!

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