2025-26 Upper Deck Series 2 Hockey is live. Release day. The most important hockey card drop of the spring, landing in a market that's been running hot since Team USA took double gold at the Winter Olympics last month.
The headline card is Matthew Schaefer (#451). First overall pick in the 2025 Draft. 18 years old. 20 goals and 44 points in 61 games as a defenseman. He passed Bobby Orr for second-most goals by an 18-year-old defenseman in NHL history back in January. Then kept going. He now holds the record outright.
Calder Trophy odds: -1000. It's not a race.
What's in the Box
Hobby boxes run 12 packs, 12 cards per pack. Six Young Guns guaranteed at 1:2 pack odds. 49 total Young Guns in the set (#451-#500).
The pricing is the story within the story. Hobby boxes are around $120 MSRP. Last year they were $280. That's a 57% drop. After years of escalation ($50 in 2021-22, $109 in 2022-23, $195 in 2023-24, $280 in 2024-25), Upper Deck reset the price point. This is the most accessible hockey product in four years.
Each box also delivers one Outburst Silver parallel, four UD Canvas cards, and a guaranteed numbered card or printing plate. The inserts include Glow-Up (1:5), Slaps (1:6), Let Them Cook (1:8), Boomtown (1:10), and IYKYK (1:10).
The chases at the top: UD Exclusives /100, Outburst Red /25, High Gloss /10, and Outburst Gold 1/1. Clear Cut parallels are hobby exclusive at 1:144 packs.
The Young Guns to Chase
Tier 1: The Headliners
Matthew Schaefer (#451, NYI) The card of the set. No debate. An 18-year-old defenseman producing like a franchise cornerstone. Leads all NHL rookies in ice time at 24:07 per game. Third among rookies in points. Tied for second among ALL defensemen in goals. Phil Housley's all-time record for 18-year-old defensemen is gone. For comp context: Celebrini's UD Exclusives /100 in PSA 9 sold for $5,500. Bedard's Rainbow Speckled PSA 9 went for $5,133. Schaefer's parallels could match or exceed those numbers given the historic season.
Michael Misa (#487, SJS) Second overall pick. Before the draft, he led the CHL in scoring with 134 points (62 goals, 72 assists) in 65 games with Saginaw. Tied John Tavares for most points by an under-18 OHL player since 2000. His NHL numbers (5 goals, 8 assists in 22 games) are modest, but the ceiling is franchise center. Pair him with Celebrini and San Jose is building something real.
Tier 2: The Value Plays
Ben Kindel (#453, PIT) The sleeper. 15 goals and 14 assists in 56 games as an 18-year-old Penguin. That makes him the fourth Penguin ever to score 15 or more goals at 18. The other three: Crosby, Staal, Jagr. The advanced stats back it up. 55.1% shot attempt share, 57.3% expected goals share. Both among the best on the team. This card is underpriced relative to the company he's keeping.
Easton Cowan (#462, TOR) 2025 Memorial Cup MVP. A 65-game OHL point streak. Now settling into an NHL role with 7 goals and 10 assists in 44 games. Standard rookie numbers, but it's Toronto. Maple Leafs Young Guns always carry premium demand. The Memorial Cup narrative gives this card a longer shelf life than the raw stats suggest.
Sam Dickinson (#479, SJS) 11th overall in 2024. 6'3", 200 pounds. Norris Trophy ceiling if development continues. Only 10 points in 19 games so far, with limited ice time (14:30 per night). That means the card stays affordable now. Long-term play.
Zeev Buium (#486, listed as MIN but now VAN) 12th overall in 2024. Won a national championship at Denver. Compared to Cale Makar. Here's the collector angle: the card lists him as a Minnesota Wild player, but he was traded to Vancouver in December as part of the Quinn Hughes deal. The Wild-logo Buium Young Guns is now a short-lived anomaly. Some collectors chase those.
Tier 3: Worth Knowing
Alexander Nikishin (#461, CAR) 24-year-old KHL veteran with a nearly 99 MPH shot. Not a traditional rookie card play, but the skill set is absurd.
Dmitri Simashev (#470, UTA) 6'5" defenseman. Sixth overall pick in 2023. Still developing but the frame is unicorn-level.
Brady Martin (#460, NSH) Fifth overall in 2025. Nashville's center of the future.
And yes, Tusky (#498) the Utah Mammoth mascot gets a Young Guns card.
A Quick Clarification
If you're hunting for Ivan Demidov or Artyom Levshunov, they're not in this set. Both of their Young Guns cards dropped in Series 1 back in November (#205 and #201 respectively). Levshunov appears on inserts in Series 2, but his flagship rookie card is already on the market.
The Market Behind This Release
Hockey cards are surging. Team USA's double gold at the Winter Olympics last month sent the market into overdrive. Jack Hughes card sales spiked 19,849% the day after his overtime gold-medal goal. From $177 per day to $35,000.
That energy is carrying into Series 2. Combine it with the most accessible price point in four years and a generational rookie class led by Schaefer, and this is the hockey product to be ripping today.
The base Schaefer Young Guns will exist in massive quantities. Six per hobby box, plus retail, blasters, and tins. But the scarce parallels are where the real value concentrates. The Exclusives /100, Red /25, High Gloss /10, and Gold 1/1 of Schaefer will be the grails from this release.
Happy hunting.
