2025 T25U25: Harry Nansi is #19

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Harry Nansi is the youngest prospect in the Leafs system as of July, and despite not being that much younger than his 2025 draft peers, he has a lot more room to grow than anyone else. Here is Harry Nansi’s turn in the Top 25 Under 25, the first spark of potential after many prospects with little to get excited about.

Harry Nansi
Vitals

Age as of July 1
17.81

Position
LW

Height
6’3″

Weight (lbs)
185

Shoots
R

Draft Year
2025

Draft Number
153

The Player

Born in Quebec, Harry Nansi played his most recent minor hockey in Ottawa before joining the OHL’s Owen Sound Attack two seasons ago. The first thing people see with Nansi is his very low point totals for a forward. They look more like one you would see from a middle-pair defender. But considering that was his output as a 16-year-old and 17-year-old, I would recommend patience. Especially when he lit up the U18 league he was playing in as a 15-year-old. To put some numbers on his season with the Nepean Raiders U18, he was top-20 in scoring among players who were all older than him. No one will be surprised to see a breakout from Nansi next season.

Nansi has spent the first two seasons as a right winger for Owen Sound, but I expect to see him play some centre at some point soon because he has the mindset of a centre on the ice. What I mean by that is he’s a very good puck distributer, he sees the game extremely well, and he’s got great hands for someone so lanky.

After he was drafted I watched as much video as I could, beyond just his goal highlights. A lot of his puck touches come in the neutral zone, taking away space from opponents or making plays to his teammates. They also come along the boards where he’s able to win puck battles or out-maneuver an opponent with his size, feet, and hands. He can move the puck laterally very quickly (and smartly) while in tight.

The fundamentals of Nansi’s game are also definitely on display when he plays. His positioning is very sound defensively and does a good job moving or making plays to create space for his linemates, or at least attempting to. The things Nansi does on the ice translate to the pro level directly. He pulls defenders to him to create space and takes pressure to make plays. He plays from the boards to the slot, using his body positioning and hands to win puck battles not only along the boards but in front of the net

You can see all of those things are mirrored in the tracking data from Mitchell Brown. Board battles won, cross-lane plays, controlled entries and exits, and his impact on xG for his teammates. Defensively very sound, and takes very few penalties, if any. All of these things point to a player who will break out when given more minutes and better teammates. And moreso when he develops physically. At 6’3″, he’s only 185 lbs! Matthew Knies is the same height and 40 lbs heavier. There is so much more muscle and mass he can add to improve.

Playing on the third line, this Neutral Zone resource report matches a lot of what I found and is a good place to begin talking about why he wasn’t a first round pick despite all the praise I’ve been pouring on.

Nansi’s physical potential will hopefully show results at some point, but for the time being one way to describe him on the ice can sometimes be awkward. His skating needs more explosiveness in order to do what he wants. Getting bigger will also help him win more puck battles. The Neutral Zone and Mitchell Brown disagree on his board battle efficiency, but I think you’ll see those numbers go up when he has teammates who can give him an outlet or more support. I don’t think he is the problem there. I also think it’ll drastically improve his shooting rate. Last season, Nansi was on the second power play unit on the right wing, not in front of the net where you might think. I’m curious to see if that continues or he moves to the front of the net.

I’m really excited about this player. In his development camp interview he talked a lot about how much he learned reagarding eating and conditioning. That’s a really good sign for me because he genuinely needs to put on a lot of weight if he’s going to unlock his potential. His hockey sense is begging for the ability to make the plays he wants, in my opinion.

When I think about who this player reminds me of, it’s not someone like Wayne Simmonds who will skate through you to make a play, or Pierre Engvall who is excellent in transition plays but the puck gets lost in the offensive zone when he can’t just shoot it himself. Instead, I get a lot of hints of JVR. Now, stop before you run to the comments. JVR was a second overall draft pick and a perennial All-Star who played for his national team over a 16-season NHL career. I don’t expect Nansi to reach those levels as a play-driving top-six winger, but I see the same playing style and mindset as I saw from JVR in Nansi. Doing the little things to get the puck moving forward, sick hands in front of the net, boards-to-slot, and always with his head up. It’s what is making JVR a prized commodity as a good veteran on a team. Nansi aims to do a lot of those same things. If he can put as much of it together as he can, he has a lot of room before he hits his ceiling.

This is game video from all of Nansi’s shifts against Flint. You can see his relentlessness on the puck. He made some hits and was very communicative on the penalty kill and generally in the defensive zone. He plays over all 200 ft of the ice, making the most for his teammates.

Scouting Reports

Brigs from a pre-draft report on late-round picks.

Nansi is interesting to me for a few reasons. First, he’s already an excellent player when it comes to everything but producing points. He’s very strong defensively, and he does a lot of little things that help his team on both sides of the puck to drive possession and create scoring chances. Second, he’s very young — less than a week away from not being eligible until next year’s draft. If he’s so good at pro-level things already, is there more room for his offense and production to spike next year and be on par with the older birthdays in this year’s draft who are almost a year older than he is? Third, I think he’s already showing flashes of some decent skill – not of a hidden offensive juggernaut by any means, but capable of handling the puck, passing it, shooting it, and creating chaos for his linemates as a supporting winger.

The Neutral Zone prospect report after last season:

Projection: Bottom-six NHL winger with size and puck pursuit potential
Development Track: Two more seasons in the OHL with a focus on building strength, enhancing puck battle success, refining puck management under pressure, and improving finishing skills. Then 2–3 years in the AHL to develop consistency, physical play, and offensive puck management.
Verdict: Nansi is a legitimate late-round option for teams seeking a long-term project with NHL frame, forechecking ability, and potential disruptive tools. While his game is currently raw, his size, youth, puck pursuit, and upward trajectory make him a player worth investing development time into, particularly for teams with strong AHL systems focused on skill and strength growth.

The Votes

Brigs voted Nansi 10th, which makes me wish I was even more bold than my 15th ranking. Within the weighted average there was a jump of 2.4 between him and his former teammate Sam McCue as the voters separated him from the bottom tier of players. There is still hesitation over where he fits in that next tier because he’s so new and raw.

Voter
Vote

Cathy
23

Brigstew
10

Species
NA

Hardev
15

shinson93
18

Cameron
16

Zone Entry
16

Svalbard38
20

dhammm
NA

adam
22

Weighted Average
19.2

Highest Vote
10

Lowest Vote
23

I’m very excited to see what he does next season and how the votes will change. Thinking about the other CHL forwards the Leafs have drafted, Nansi could end up somewhere between Hopkins at the top, Holinka around the middle, and McCue. Can he be a centre? Where can his offense take him? How much mass can he put on? All those questions will determine where he ends up in a year from now.

The OpinionsBrigstew: I love him. He’s the youngest player on this list. He will probably be the longest term project that Toronto will work on, but he is the ultimate mystery box player in terms of his potential. But at some point, he’s gotta start turning that potential into reality. I ranked him aggressively because I was already high on him, and seeing Toronto take him and hear what Leach said about him, I am trusting in the team’s ability to find and develop players who still have big breakouts and surges in improvement after being drafted.Cameron: Nansi is a player I had on my list of players I hoped the Leafs would draft, so I was very happy to see him get drafted by them! I’m sure you’ll hear this a lot but Nansi is a very unrefined prospect that will surely be a long term project. However, I think if he hits he could be a very useful player, while his skating needs work his puck handling can be quite impressive.Shinson93: Nansi is pretty raw and young. I think he probably has the most to gain from being early in his development curve and having time to work with the Leafs staff. I gave him that benefit in my ranking, but he’s one of the guys I’ll be watching and cheering on to take some big steps next year.dhammm: On the bubble of my ranking with William Belle. When I read profiles about prospects that talk about skill and tools, my reflex is to ask why if this is the case they’re not scoring more against OHL competition. For Nansi, it seems part of the answer is a mix of ice time and the power play, but this doesn’t convince me; the 2024-25 Owen Sound Attack were not a murderer’s row, so why couldn’t Nansi take someone’s job? There are many reasons besides base Leaf fandom that I hope Nansi has the kind of D+1 that shuts me up and gets me excited, but I’m skeptical for now.Svalbard38: We often talk about these guys as “kids”, but in Nansi’s case it’s actually true. He’s not an adult. He won’t be until September. Players at this age are still developing, physically and as players, so if there’s concerns with his skating or worries that his game is a bit unrefined, I think he deserves a bit more runway than he would if he were several months older. It sounds like the plan in Owen Sound is to use him more on the power play this coming season, which is an opportunity I’d like to see him grab on to and hold. Bottom line, he’s a 5th round pick with a lot of skills and some stuff to work on. He’s a “go big or go home” type prospect, and considering that you go home on most late rounders, I like when we take the swing on a guy who fits that profile.Cathy: Normally, I try to avoid ranking anyone drafted in late rounds in part because the meme about players drafted after about 45th is that if they get better, they’ll be good. And the scale of the get and the amount of the better is huge for most of these guys. They’re unknown, so there’s a chance, and banking on slim chances is why gambling companies are rich. But. There are some tangible things that can with high probability improve here. Nansi will get stronger and bigger and faster. I don’t think there’s a maybe about that. And when he does, he’ll be a player that already plays hockey which is something I think matters more than goals scored as a teenager. I ranked him against my usual tendency because there really is runway here unlike with some 24-year-old. There is a chance. He might not make my ranking look bad someday, but it is possible here on planet Earth. No hopium required.

What do you think about Harry Nansi? Is he a diamond in the rough?

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