Cole Eiserman has worked tirelessly to hone his goal-scoring craft. But this NHL draft prospect is no one-trick pony.

Photo by Rena Laverty/USA Hockey NTDP

The mid-October meeting between Boston University and USA Hockey’s National Team Development Program’s U-18 squad wasn’t an audition for Cole Eiserman so much as it was a showcase. But there were any number of reasons the standout American sniper entered the game under the microscope.

In part, it was a chance to prove he could be a future star for the Terriers, to whom he’d committed only weeks prior. It gave Eiserman the opportunity to go head-to-head with his former Shattuck-St. Mary’s teammate Macklin Celebrini, the consensus No. 1 pick heading into the June NHL draft. And it was another occasion for Eiserman to prove he can perform on a big stage under the bright lights.

“There were lots of pieces to that game,” said NTDP coach Nick Fohr, “and he just rose.”

In action, that looked like Eiserman receiving a pass in transition before making a perfect feed to Cole Hutson to put the NTDP ahead 1-0 less than five minutes in. It looked like Eiserman driving wide before tucking home a backhand less than three minutes later. And it looked like Eiserman adding another goal in the first period, another helper in the second and then completing the hat trick with a power-play blast in the third for a three-goal, five-point, six-shot, plus-four evening against his future club.

“I knew he could score,” Fohr said. “I knew he could do all these things, but that moment this year was like, ‘All right, this kid has got something there that gives him a chance to be a world-world-class hockey player.’ ”

That isn’t the first time that tag has been attached to Eiserman, mind you.

“When you start to get that label as a goal-scorer, it starts to become more of an external pressure. I like it. It drives me and never really keeps me satisfied, so I think it’s good to have.” – Cole Eiserman

He first appeared in The Hockey News in 2022, then tabbed as the 22nd-best 21-and-under player in the world in Prospects Unlimited, and again last year in Draft Preview 2023, at which time he was projected as a top-two selection in the upcoming NHL draft. (Technically, he also appeared in 2013 in a feature about his older brother Shane, though Cole was referenced only as one of two then-seven-year-old twin brothers.)

Even before he graced these pages, though, he was tearing up the U.S. high-school circuit with Shattuck, all the while heralded as one of the next big things.

It’s never been all that difficult to ascertain why, either.

Though his per-game scoring rate has declined as the level of competition has risen from middle-school wunderkinds to legitimate elite-level NHL hopefuls, Eiserman has proven himself time and again to be the most gifted and pure goal-scorer of his draft cohort – and perhaps even any in the past decade.

Since the beginning of his 2020-21 prep-school season, he’s scored 290 goals in 233 games. That includes 58 goals in 57 games this season, bringing his NTDP total to an incredible 127 – one more than the previous record held by Cole Caufield.

“What I always tell people, especially when we start talking about Cole and his abilities as a hockey player, he does the hardest thing in hockey the best,” Fohr said. “Scoring, and scoring big ones, and scoring them when we need it. Being that go-to guy and the guy you can count on to score a goal for your team really every night.”

But it isn’t just that Eiserman scores. It’s that he’s set for himself the expectation that he will score and do so with a consistency few players can match. It’s enough that Fohr is only barely joking when he says Eiserman is upset with himself if he’s not scoring at least one a night.

“It’s a pressure I gave myself at a young age,” Eiserman said. “Whether it’s good or bad, I’ve always had that pressure on myself. Now, when you start to get that label as a goal-scorer, it starts to become more of an external pressure. I like it. It drives me and never really keeps me satisfied, so I think it’s good to have.”

This is an excerpt from Jared Clinton’s feature on Eiserman in The Hockey News’ Draft Preview. To read the full article and much more, they’re all available to you with a subscription at THN.com/Free. Your subscription includes access to more than 76 years of exclusive articles at The Hockey News Archive.

With more on which teams could be in the range to draft Eiserman, here’s Adam Proteau: