Since being drafted by Edmonton in the third round of the 2017 NHL Entry Draft, Stuart Skinner has cemented himself in the minds of Oilers fans everywhere. That idea was amplified after Skinner’s very successful 2017-18 season, where he backstopped the Swift Current Broncos to the WHL Championship. This year, Skinner will get his first taste of professional hockey as he looks to continue his development and take the next step towards the ultimate goal of playing for the Edmonton Oilers. So what do the Oilers have in Skinner? Let’s find out.
BIO:
Born: November 1st, 1998 — City: Edmonton, Alberta
Height: 6 feet 3 inch — Weight: 205 lbs [185 cm/93 kg]
NEWS AND SCOUTING REPORTS
Continuing with the tradition of our prospect profiles, we looked around the web to find varying scouting reports and analysis of Skinner to try and figure out what exactly the Oilers have in him. With expectations as high as they are for the young netminder, we felt it was important to look for a balanced evaluation of his skill set to give us a better idea of what type of player he is and could turn out to be.
Jason Gregor spoke about Stuart Skinner last week when he profiled the Oilers Top 10 prospects that are currently in the system.
He will be able to work with Oilers goalie coach Dustin Schwartz every off-season in Edmonton. That should be a huge advantage for him. Goalies are extremely difficult to project, but Stuart has all the tools to push for an NHL job in the future. Odds are we won’t see Skinner in the NHL for at least three or four years. Last year only seven goalies 24 years old and under played 25 NHL games. Juuse Saros (22) played 25 games. Tristan Jarry (22) played 26, Matt Murray (23) played 49, John Gibson (24) played 60, Andre Vasilevskiy (23) played 65 and Connor Hellebuyck (24) played 66 games. Patience will be a must for Skinner’s development.
Late last year, Tyler Yaremchuk had the chance to chat with Stuart Skinner about what it was like to be drafted by the team he grew up cheering for and where he sees his career heading.
“Definitely one of the best moments of my life,” said a smiling Stuart Skinner when I asked him about being selected 78th overall by his hometown team, the Edmonton Oilers.
“It was pretty cool hearing my name and I was kind of shocked about it” added the 18-year-old puck stopper. “Once I put on that jersey, it was kind of a surreal feeling.”
His numbers with the Broncos are undoubtedly impressive but there is some concern on whether or not he is a product of playing on such a strong team. Regardless, the Oilers have to be hoping that they can groom Skinner to be their goaltender of the future. It‘s important to note that the Oilers haven‘t developed an NHL goaltender since they drafted Devan Dubnyk 14th overall in 2004
Goalies rarely hurt their reputations from a TPG since the event is normally low scoring. Skinner, who had a tough start to his season, entered the TPG with a chance to confirm how solid his play of late has been (he’s faced 30 or more shots in 29 of 44 appearances, including 13 with over 39 shots against). What stood out most was Skinner’s rebound control in a game featuring great scoring chances with traffic milling around the low slot. His ability to track shots from the release point helped, but his quickness and butterfly timing allowed him to absorb several high-quality chances.
Skinner spoke about the bond between goaltending prospects after wrapping up this year’s development camp:
We’re a really tight group. All these guys are great guys, professional, hard workers.
It’s Rodrigue’s first NHL camp. Seeing him on the ice, he’s a special goalie out there. Same with Starret and Wellsy.
I love those guys, they are really great guys and we have a great friendship.
PRE-DRAFT RANKINGS
- NHL Central Scouting: 5th (NA, Final)
- NHL Central Scouting: 9th (NA, Mid-term)
- Bob McKenzie: 57th
- Craig Button: 79th
- ISS: Unranked
VIDEO AND HIGHLIGHTS
An in-depth highlight package from Stuart Skinner’s 2017-18 season”
The WHL put together a highlight package for Skinner after his season wrapped up.
SKINNER!!! cc: @EdmontonOilers; @SCBroncos pic.twitter.com/9Bi5BS723R
— The WHL (@TheWHL) May 14, 2018
Skinner’s post-draft interview:
A highlight package from the 2016-17 season:
SEASON STATS
| SEASON | TEAM | LEAGUE | GP | GAA | SVS% | GP | GAA | SVS% |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2011-12 | SSAC Lions Bantam AAA | AMBHL | 18 | 2.59 | .910 | 11 | 2.60 | .900 |
| 2012-13 | SSAC Lions Bantam AAA | AMBHL | 21 | 1.75 | .929 | 11 | 1.45 | .947 |
| 2013-14 | SSAC Athletics Midget AAA | AMHL | 20 | 2.74 | .916 | |||
| Lethbridge Hurricanes | WHL | 4 | 5.17 | .866 | ||||
| 2014-15 | Lethbridge Hurricanes | WHL | 43 | 3.69 | .909 | |||
| Canada Black U17 | WHC-17 | 3 | 4.05 | .859 | ||||
| 2015-16 | Lethbridge Hurricanes | WHL | 44 | 2.73 | .920 | 4 | 3.76 | .862 |
| Canada U18 | WJC-18 | 3 | 2.82 | .860 | ||||
| 2016-17 | Lethbridge Hurricanes | WHL | 60 | 3.26 | .905 | 20 | 3.09 | .916 |
| 2017-18 | Lethbridge Hurricanes | WHL | 31 | 3.38 | .897 | |||
| Swift Current Broncos | WHL | 25 | 2.68 | .914 | 26 | 2.20 | .932 |
TOURNAMENT STATS
| SEASON | TEAM | LEAGUE | GP | GAA | SVS% |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2012-13 | Team Edmonton South | Alberta Cup | 3 | 2.83 | .882 |
| 2013-14 | Team Alberta | WCCC-16 | 2 | 2.00 | .895 |
| 2014-15 | Team Black | U17-Dev | 3 | 3.21 | .915 |
| 2015-16 | Team White | U18-Dev | 3 | 4.60 | .788 |
| 2017-18 | Swift Current Broncos | M-Cup | 3 | 4.02 | .902 |
| WHL All-Stars | Canada/Russia Series | 1 | 4.16 | .879 |
Stats provided by Elite Prospects
Previously:
- All About Patrick Russell
- All About Caleb Jones
- All About Kirill Maksimov
- All About Olivier Rodrigue
- All About Evan Bouchard
Skinner out-dueling Cart Hart, the top tending prospect out there, in the WHL final last year was something special to see.
Its going to be curious to see where the goalies all play next year but I think it might be something along the lines of the following:
AHL – Montoya/Skinner – 50/50 split – hopefully Montoya has the proper attitude and takes on a mentor role
ECHL – Wells/Starrett
I’m not giving up on Wells either – he had a tough year but the Pete’s were absolutely awful – Wells saw a ton of rubber and a ton of high end scoring chances.
Another note about Skinner and the Oilers is the absolutely rave reviews that he has given Manny Viverios. Yes, I know Stuart will be in the minor leagues and Viverios with the big club but I think it will be nice for Skinner to have Viverios in the organization.
I was lucky enough to watch a lot of Skinner while he was with Lethbridge. He absolutely carried the team through 2 playoff rounds. This is a kid who comes up big whenever the stakes are highest.
The one report read that he may have benefited from playing on a stacked team, well wouldn’t that be a no brainer! However, Swift’s defends was lacking beyond their first pair and was finally exposed in the Mcup. I think/hope we have a diamond in the rough with skippy! Fingers crossed.
skinner will get nhl games next season in 2019-20
Fingers crossed that Skinner keeps progressing and that he gets the icetime needed to make that happen.
Skinner is very poised in the net compared to most junior goaltenders. He definitely appears to have a shot at turning into an NHL tender.
5 years ago this wasn’t possible. 5 years ago we didn’t have depth, prospects, or anyone to be excited about (except the 1st overall pick). Now our pipelines are stocked. We have NHL caliber prospects who we can call upon at a moments notice. This is fantastic. Kudos to Peter and Keith.
We really have top prospects in net should be interesting 3 years from now.
I love the kid but i’m more excited to hear Onrait and O’Toole have fun with his surname.
Skinner had a very unremarkable Memorial Cup this year. He did not do well at the elite level among his peers. I wish the Oilers had taken Max Paddock with one of their late round picks. Paddock really is a super athletic goaltender. You know that term a goaltender who can win a game all by himself? The Oilers might have got it wrong about Brossoit. Jets management and coaching staff were absolutely tickled pink that Brossoit was available for free. Hellebuyck is happy to have an able backup. Jets goaltending coach Rick St Croix got his man. Rick St Croix has been a goaltending coach since before the term existed. The Jets are an excellent organisation and they don’t make many blunders or get it wrong about things including goalies. I like Skinner but he is a bit of long shot.
1. Skinner is a fantastic goalie who stood on his head when Swift Current needed him most.
2. Brossoit was yet another Oil Kings goalie who the previous guys wanted. Yes he’s a decent goalie, but his play this year was spotty at time (especially in that 2nd meeting with Calgary)
Brossoit just couldn’t seem to fill Talbot’s spot as a backup. I guess Brossoit and Montoya were just holding down the spot until a starter came to town and I sure hope it is Koskinen or we forked!
How did he not do well at the elite level among his peers? He out-dueled the #1 goalie prospect in hockey during the WHL final.
Respectfully disagree. Calgary gave up on Brossoit. He was rated lower in their system than John Gillies. And Gillies has no NHL upside. LB Is not a kid anymore. He had many chances in Edmonton and failed to grab a job. And Skinner was likely burnt out by the time he got to memorial cup. He outplayed Phillys golden boy Carter Hart in the playoffs. Imo Skinner has tremendous upside
Respectfully disagree. Skinner was lights out throughout most of the WHL playoffs, and kept the Broncos in their games at the Memorial Cup. That entire team was exhausted and hurt far worse than they were letting on. After watching the WHL final, I would posit that Skinner is at least as talented as Hart (who benefited from a great Everett defensive system, something Skinner did not have in Swift Current). The Broncos had a “bend-but-don’t-break” mentality when it came to defence, and it wasn’t unusual to see Skinner with 40+ saves during the playoffs.
The glory era had Fuhr & Moog. Moog was 19 when they took down Montreal first round. I get it that tending is a lot more tech these days,…