2024-25 Miami preview: Forwards

Miami was limited to 78 goals in 36 games last season.

That 2.17 scoring clip was the fifth-worst in Division I, but the RedHawks have added several high-caliber forward scoring threats through the transfer portal and multiple freshmen who can find the net.

Miami’s forward corps of 18 will have a veteran presence, as 10 of 11 returning skaters up front will have played at least two college seasons. With six extra forwards, the competition for lineup slots should be intense.

Of the seven new forwards, three are coming in as senior or graduate senior transfers and the other four are freshmen.

“When you look at the transfers, they’re guys that have proven they can score before at this level,” coach Anthony Noreen said. “They’re going to get an opportunity to do that and to play key roles in what is a pivotal year, not just for us but for them and their hockey career, trying to move forward.

“For some of the returning guys, I think another year, bigger, stronger, older, more experienced, I’m hoping some raw offense comes out of those guys up front. And then we’ve got some newcomers, and there’s some ability there and some different type of players that can add to that as well.”

VFTG takes a look at the forwards in Part II of our 2024-25 Miami Preview.

Part I can be found here: Overview.

WHO’S BACK: Grad seniors (2): Ryan Sullivan, Brian Silver*; Sr. (1): Raimonds Vitolins; Jrs. (7): John Waldron, Max Dukovac, William Hallen, Frankie Carogioiello, Blake Mesenburg, Brayden Morrison, Artur Turansky; So. (1): Tanyon Bajzer.

WHO’S GONE (transfers in parentheses): Matthew Barbolini, P.J. Fletcher, Albin Nilsson, Thomas Daskas (Michigan), Teddy Lagerback (Stonehill).

WHO’S NEW (transfers’ previous teams in parentheses, others are freshmen): Colby Ambrosio (Boston College), Matt Choupani (Northeastern), John Emmons, Christophe Fillion (Quinnipiac), Teodor Forssander, David Grosek, Casper Nassen.

*-played with Miami previously

ANALYSIS: Miami struggled to score last year, and Matthew Barbolini and P.J. Fletcher — two of three RedHawks skaters to eclipse 20 points last season — are now in the pros.

But junior John Waldron returns after finishing third in points with a 9-13-22 line, and Raimonds Vitolins tallied six goals and 11 assists for 17 points despite missing eight games due to injury.

Both are candidates for Miami’s top line.

Waldron owns the RedHawks’ lone hat trick of the past eight years (prior to that, Conor Lemirande was the last Miami skater to score three goals in a game in 2016), and he had two points streaks of five games last season, including a 3-5-8 start to the season.

Vitolins scored three goals and assisted on three more the first five games, but he was banged up the rest of the season, missing games during three different stints.

Max Dukovac and William Hallen notched 10 points apiece in 2023-24, and along with Artur Turansky (9 points), all are juniors that have shown lots of promise and look to take a step forward.

Dukovac has shown wicked offensive skills at times and battled through a miserable mid-season drought in which he was held with a point 15 straight games, but he finished strong with four points in the final six contests.

Due to injury, Hallen’s season ended on Jan. 26, but he finished with a solid 3-7-10 line in 23 games. Turansky racked up five points the first three games of 2023-24 but rolled up just four more the balance of the season.

Graduate senior Sullivan also tallied nine points last season (5-4-9) and appears to be taking a leadership position on the team.

Juniors Frankie Carogioiello and Blake Mesenburg, senior Brayden Morrison and sophomore Tanyon Bajzer all return. The latter three all played significant roles for Miami in 2023-24, but an injury limited Carogioiello to four games.

Mesenburg and Carogioiello have both proven solid bottom-six energy forwards (and Carogioiello appears to be 100 percent healthy, great news considering his injury last season could’ve been career ending), and Morrison and Bajzer took advantage of their opportunities when dressed as well.

Brian Silver is also back for his graduate senior year after spending three seasons at Miami and transferring to Augustana to play for its inaugural class in 2023-24. With the RedHawks, Silver is 2-1-3 in 37 games and was a hard-working fourth-liner when he was in the lineup.

Graduate senior transfers Christophe Fillion and Colby Ambrosio are both coming from east coast schools that advanced to or won a national title game in the past two seasons.

Fillion spent the last four years at Quinnipiac, winning an NCAA championship in 2023. The Quebecker has 25 goals and 29 assists in 124 games for the Bobcats, including a career-best 12 goals last season.

Ambrosio’s Boston College team fell to Denver in the Division I title game this spring. In 138 games with the Eagles, the fourth-round Colorado Avalanche draftee went 28-38-66, eclipsing the 20-point mark his sophomore and junior seasons.

Another Quebec-born forward, senior Matt Choupani should also chip in right away up front. The Northeastern transfer tallied 41 points in three years there.

Of the freshman, Casper Nassen will be just the second RedHawk since 2018 to play his first college season at Miami (Red Savage in 2021 and Jonathan Gruden in 2018 were the last two).

Nassen, 6-feet, 4-inches tall and a seventh-round pick of the Boston Bruins in 2023, notched 16 goals and 15 assists in 41 games for Vastra Frolunda of the Swedish juniors program.

Teammate Teodor Forssander, who is eight inches shorter and 50 pounds lighter, led that Frolunda team with 41 points in 43 games, dishing for a team-best 29 assists.

The Swedish duo should make a significant impact up front for the RedHawks, but neither has played a single game in North America. Typically players that move to the U.S. or Canada to play advanced-level hockey spend at least a season in juniors to facilitate the transition to the more physical game on smaller ice surfaces.

So it’s unclear how long it will take the tandem to become acclimated to the North American game, but the pair definitely proven in juniors that they can play, and smart money is on them both becoming solid contributors sooner than later.

John Emmons and David Grosek are both beginning their D-1 careers after playing multiple seasons in the NAHL.

Emmons logged 107 games with Minot (one of the best franchises in the league) and racked up 27 and 26 points in his two seasons there.

Grosek has played parts of the three seasons with three different teams in the league, including a career-high 35 games with Maine in 2023-24 and going 1-1-2 with 84 penalty minutes.

The deeper forward corps should give Miami two formidable power play units, as the man-advantage was a major weakness last season.

But having 18 forwards — meaning six are likely scratched each — is not optimal in subsequent seasons, Noreen said.

“Long-term, is that an ideal number for us? No,” Noreen said. “But for right now, some of the (players) in the transfer portal…we didn’t want to pass up, and just to create that internal competition.”

The RedHawks converted at just a 13.2 percent clip on the power play, fifth-worst in Division I and a key reason Miami averaged barely two goals per game.

While this team probably won’t resemble the 1983-84 Edmonton Oilers, Miami should be able to find the net more this season.