When the 2024-2025 National Hockey League season kicked off in early October, first-round picks Sacha Boisvert and Matvei Gridin weren’t on their teams’ rosters - at least not yet. 

With Quebec native Boisvert at the University of North Dakota and the Russian-born Gridin suiting up for the QMJHL’s Shawinigan Cataractes, their NHL debuts are coming sooner rather than later. Hearing their names called in Las Vegas over the summer was already a remarkable moment for their Muskegon franchise and the USHL as a whole. 

Before the 47 regular-season wins and the team’s run to the USHL’s Eastern Conference finals, Parker Burgess, head coach of the Muskegon Lumberjacks, knew the duo had the chance to be remarkable. 

Entering his third year with the franchise, Burgess got a glimpse of what Sacha Boisvert and Matvei Gridin were capable of early in the 2023-2024 season, as the pair combined for nine goals and 13 points during the Lumberjacks’ four September contests.

By the time Muskegon was swept by the Eastern Conference’s top-seeded Dubuque Fighting Saints in the Clark Cup Playoffs, Gridin led the team in scoring with 39 goals and 88 points, while Boisvert ranked second in the lineup with 36 goals and 72 points. 

Two months later and nearly 2,000 miles from their (now) former hockey home, Boisvert was selected No. 18 overall by the Chicago Blackhawks, and Gridin went twenty-eighth overall to the Calgary Flames at the NHL Draft in Las Vegas. 

“Right off the bat, it was easy to see the qualities they brought to the game, the intensity and commitment they had (toward) their development,” Burgess said after a game in September during the league’s Fall Classic event in Cranberry Township, Pennsylvania. “We knew a lot of work had to go into it, but if we (as coaches) did our job and helped them along the way, that was something that was maybe a possibility.” 

Burgess added that the first-round picks of a Canadian and Russian hailing from the USHL bodes well for the league’s ability to attract and develop talent from nontraditional pipelines. 

“You have a French-Canadian player and a Russian player, players who ten years ago traditionally (wouldn’t) choose a path like the USHL, but for them to come to the USHL and have success and accomplish that goal of going in the first round, I think it really speaks to how far the league’s come,” Burgess said.

Boisvert and Gridin grabbed headlines as first-rounders, but Burgess is quick to point out that they weren’t the only Lumberjacks NHL franchises that had their sights set on. 

 “Obviously, to see two guys achieve their goals and get drafted into the NHL after two years in Muskegon, and it was a little feather in their cap going in the first round,” Burgess said. “We’re obviously really proud of those guys, but we had five guys that were drafted, so we’re equally as proud of everybody who got their name called that day.” 

In addition to Boisvert and Gridin, Muskegon’s Xavier Veilleux went 179th overall to the New York Islanders, while Joe Connor and Bauer Berry were picked in the seventh round by Tampa Bay and Edmonton, respectively. With five players selected, Muskegon ranked second among Clark Cup-eligible USHL teams in drafted players. Dubuque was first in the same category with six drafted players this season. 

The National Team Development Program’s Under-18 squad, which competes in the league but does not participate in the USHL postseason, had 14 players selected. 

USHL commissioner Glenn Hefferan is pleased with his league’s showing at this year’s draft, especially as its numbers continue to match - and sometimes exceed - those of more traditionally established junior leagues. 

“We are thrilled with our NHL Draft performance this year,” Hefferan said via text message. “Considering the OHL has 20 teams, and we have 16, and we tied them this year (with 39 players selected) and have consistently beaten them in the previous five years, I think we’re always on pace for our best year yet.”