The Seventh Round Surprise the Blues Can’t Ignore

When you think about players in the St. Louis Blues’ prospect pipeline, names like

Justin Carbonneau, Adam Jiricek, Lukas Fischer, and Aleksanteri Kaskimaki come to

mind. Otto Stenberg and Theo Lindstein graduated to the big club in 2025-’26 and

they look like they’ll be there to stay based on how they played with the Blues.

One name you might not know is Matvei Korotky. Who is Matvei Korotky you ask?

He was the Blues’ seventh round pick (211 th overall) in 2024. He’s a six-foot, 194-

pound center who currently plays for SKA St. Petersburg in the KHL. The 20-year-

old Korotky finished this past season with 14 goals and 27 points in 43 games. Not

bad numbers considering the KHL is not an easy league to put up points.

The intangibles that stand out for Korotky are his heavy shot, which is his defining

trait. He finds soft spots in coverage while getting open well, he plays a physical

game, he’s a good skater, and also shows good defensive awareness. He’s not flashy

like 21-year-old Matvei Michkov, who was the seventh overall draft pick of the

Philadelphia Flyers in 2023, but he is more of a hard, north-south scorer with size.

The best-case scenario for Korotky is he could end up as a middle-six center with a

scoring touch and physical edge but realistically, he probably ends up as a bottom-

six energy type of power forward who can chip in some offense. He’s still raw, so

those projections could be completely wrong. The fact he’s put up numbers in the

KHL at this age makes him an interesting prospect. At one point during the season,

he was among the top under-21 scorers in the league. If his skating and defensive

game catches up, he could become a legit NHL depth player. Think of a lighter

version of Ivan Barbashev with a bit more scoring upside.

Korotky is signed with the KHL until 2027. The question then becomes do the Blues

bring him to Springfield of the AHL or do they continue to let him develop overseas?

Korotky is signed with the KHL until 2027, so the Blues don’t have to rush the

decision. For now, the best thing they can do is let him continue to develop against

top competition overseas and see how his game evolves. If the production continues

and the details round out, there will come a time to bring him to Springfield and test

him on North American ice.

Until then, Korotky remains one of the more intriguing wait-and-see prospects in

the system: a seventh-round pick who’s already outperforming expectations and

quietly putting himself on the Blues’ radar for the future. For a Blues team that has

built its identity on physical, hard-to-play-against forwards, Korotky’s style fits the

mold of the type of player that has historically found success in St. Louis. If he can

get an opportunity to make the Blues, Matvei Korotky could be a very integral piece

for the team for years to come.

Jason Fink can also be found at thesidearmer.com

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