Calgary Flames prospect Etienne Morin has joined the AHL’s Wranglers

(The Flames have until June 1, 2025 to sign Morin to an entry-level deal. Since they haven’t done so yet, they retain his NHL rights but he has to sign an AHL try-out deal to join the Wranglers. It’s purely an administrative exercise, and for all intents and purposes the Flames assigned him to the Wranglers.)

The 19-year-old Morin plied his trade with the QMJHL’s Moncton Wildcats this past season – as he did the previous two seasons – and was a fixture for them in offensive oriented situations, such as the power play. After being a stellar offensive producer in his draft year, leading to him being selected at 48th overall by the Flames, Morin was merely pretty good.

In 2022-23, Morin had 21 goals and 72 points over 67 games. We don’t have great advanced stats for the QMJHL, but he was plus-29 and had 38 even strength points. This past season, he had 12 goals and 49 points over 58 games. He was minus-9 and had 23 even strength points. The Wildcats had a better goal differential this season than last, so what this suggests is that Morin (and/or his teammates) were fighting it a bit this season in terms of puck luck.

Some evidence in favour of that conclusion are Morin’s personal shot metrics. He increased his shots-per-game totals from 3.17 last season to 3.29 this season. His personal shooting percentage, though, dropped from 9.9% last season to 6.3% this season. On its own, replicating last season’s shooting percentage would’ve resulted in seven more goals for Morin.

Player development isn’t linear, and plenty of players have had challenging Draft-Plus-One seasons and turned into pretty good pros. And after a challenging offensive season for Morin, joining the Wranglers means he potentially gets to play more hockey… or even just that he gets some additional face time and teaching time with the Flames’ player development staff.

Morin’s a player the Flames are extremely excited about and believe in. One bad offensive season isn’t going to make them fall out of love with him. And a few weeks with the Wranglers could do a lot to set up Morin for a productive off-season of growing and learning.