Youngstown's Tobias Trejbal tops Daily Faceoff's 2026 goalie rankings

Tobias Trejbal has turned a strong USHL season into draft-week momentum at exactly the right time. With the 2026 NHL Draft set for June 26-27 at KeyBank Center in Buffalo, the Youngstown Phantoms netminder sits atop Daily Faceoff’s goalie rankings and has become the clearest example of why the USHL keeps producing NHL-caliber crease prospects.

Trejbal’s appeal starts with the traits scouts chase now: a 6-foot-4 frame, quick hands, quicker feet and a game that does not look rushed even when the pressure rises. Daily Faceoff’s read is that the busier Trejbal is, the better he plays, a valuable sign for NHL teams that want a goalie who can handle workload without losing structure. NHL Central Scouting backed that up by ranking him third among North American goalies in its final 2026 list, while NHL.com identified him as one of three right-handed catchers among the top five North American netminders.

The numbers explain the buzz. Trejbal won USHL Goalie of the Year and was a finalist for Rookie of the Year after posting a league-best 2.12 goals-against average and a .916 save percentage in 42 games. Youngstown’s season, which included a share of the Anderson Cup, was built around his consistency in net, and his regular-season line reached 30-9-3-0 in one league award announcement. In a later Youngstown update, he was listed at 29-9-3-0 with a 2.15 goals-against average and a .915 save percentage, a small statistical split that still points to the same profile: elite results over a heavy workload.

His biggest spotlight moment came at the 2026 Chipotle All-American Game in Plymouth, Michigan, where he stopped all 19 shots he faced in 30 minutes and walked out as the story of the event. That showing fit the scouting description of a goalie who tracks pucks well through traffic, moves efficiently and plays a smart, simple, mentally strong game. For an NHL class that may not send a goalie off the board in the first round, that kind of dependable structure could drive a strong second-through-fourth-round run.

Trejbal’s path also says plenty about the USHL itself. He arrived in Youngstown after being taken in the fifth round of the 2025 USHL Phase II Draft, then surged into elite draft discussion in one North American season. His University of Massachusetts commitment points to a patient development arc, and NHL.com’s preview noted that five of the six top-ranked North American-based goalies in this draft hail from Czechia. That makes Trejbal part of a larger trend, but his case is the sharpest one: a Czech-born goalie from Most, sharpened in Youngstown, now carrying the league’s best draft-case at the position into Buffalo.