All of the Philadelphia Flyers prospects participating in the 2026 World Junior Championships prevailed with a win on Day 1, but it was the unheralded players who stood out most.
Flyers 2024 second-round pick Jack Berglund, captaining Sweden, kicked things off with a 3-2 win over Slovakia.
Berglund, 19, helped get his nation started in transition, and then Victor Eklund found Anton Frondell all alone for a fatal breakaway chance, putting the Swedes up 2-0 and earning Berglund a secondary assist.
The following act saw recent late-round draft picks Heikki Ruohonen, Max Westergard, and their Finland clash with the lowly Denmark, which ended in a 6-2 thrashing in favor of the Finns.
Ruohonen and Westergard each found the score sheet with an assist and overall probably put together the most complete team performance of the first day of World Juniors.
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Future fan-favorite Shane Vansaghi featured as USA’s 13th forward and only played five minutes with a -1 rating, but the Americans did escape Germany with a 6-3 win at the end of the day.
As for the Flyers’ two biggest prospects, Porter Martone and Jett Luchanko (the latter especially) had quiet days for Canada, though, as the theme of the article goes, they, too, won their game, claiming a 7-5 win over Czechia.
Martone scored the empty-net goal to seal the deal, but on his way back to the bench sarcastically slapped Adam Novotny on the rear, earning himself an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty in the process.
Deserved, but a pretty funny moment and a classic Flyer at that.
At least Martone (and his fellow Flyers prospects) all enjoyed a win and a successful first day with no further complications.