Islanders recall Victor Eklund after quick AHL impact in Bridgeport

Nine points in seven AHL games changed Victor Eklund’s timeline fast. The Islanders pulled the 2025 16th-overall pick back to the NHL for their season finale after his brief Bridgeport run showed why the club did not need to treat him like a normal post-draft project.

Eklund arrived from Sweden on March 26 and was in Bridgeport’s lineup two nights later, when he scored the shootout winner in a 3-2 victory over Laval. He had told the club he did not want to sit out his first AHL game because he wanted to play immediately after the flight from Djurgårdens, and he backed that up by picking up his first AHL point with an assist the next night in a 6-4 loss to Providence. The AHL’s player page listed him at 8 points in 5 games, but the broader picture was the same: his pace, playmaking and willingness to jump straight into important minutes made an NHL look come much sooner than expected.

For Bridgeport, the impact went beyond one hot stretch. The club had finished last in the AHL with 37 points in 2024-25 and had improved by 25 points with 10 games still left when Eklund arrived, deep in a playoff chase. The league described him as a significant pickup, and the Islanders used the late-season window to give prospects like Eklund and Cole Eiserman games that mattered, not just minutes to fill a roster.

The 18-year-old winger brought a résumé that already suggested a rapid climb. New York chose him 16th overall in the 2025 draft, signed him to a three-year entry-level contract on July 14, and watched him leave Djurgårdens after a rookie SHL season of 24 points in 43 games. He also produced 8 points in 7 games for Sweden during its gold-medal run at the 2026 World Juniors. At 5-foot-11 and 161 pounds, the right shot from Stockholm also carries a family name familiar to NHL fans, with older brother William Eklund having gone seventh overall to the San Jose Sharks in 2021 and spent time in the AHL before becoming an NHL regular.

The recall says as much about Bridgeport’s evaluation period as it does about Eklund’s ceiling. With Bridgeport headed to Hamilton, Ontario for 2026-27 after 25 years in Connecticut, every late-season audition has extra weight. Eklund’s brief AHL stop did not look like a courtesy assignment. It looked like a prospect moving too quickly for the old timeline to hold.