It’s that time of year where the NHL season is about to end with a Stanley Cup champion and less than a week later, a new one begins with the NHL draft set to begin this coming Friday. For the last 16 years I’ve been covering the draft as I’ve always been a fan of building a Stanley Cup winner through the draft as in the days of New York Islanders Hall of Fame general manager, Bill Torrey. Am I a scout? No. Do I have a background in research? Yes and that’s how develop my rankings: Lots of reading and videos, even going to live games when I get the chance.
What have I learned about this years draft from my research? It’s probably the youngest group of players I have “seen” in a very long time, maybe ever. The New York Islanders have the 20th pick in the draft, and I can honestly say that in terms of rankings, there isn’t much of a difference between numbers 20-50. One person could have a player ranked 23rd and someone else could have that same player at number 30 and the only thing different is the personal preference. This will be a “Philosophical Draft.” What does that mean? It means there’s a very good chance everyone’s mock draft will be wrong because the general managers have their own choices of what they want to do with their pick and what is right for their organization. Trades are very likely in this draft and drafting players much sooner than everyone thought will happen.
With all of this written down, I’m presenting my top 50 NHL Draft prospect rankings for your Sunday reading pleasure. Enjoy:
1 Macklin Celebrini C
2 Ivan Demidov LW
3 Artyom Levshunov D
4 Cayden Lindstrom C
5 Sam Dickinson D
6 Berkly Catton C
7 Zeev Buium D
8 Anton Silayev D
9 Zayne Parekh D
10 Konsta Helenius C
11 Cole Eiserman LW
12 Tij Iginla LW
13 Carter Yakemchuk D
14 Michael Brandsegg-Nygård RW
15 Liam Greentree RW
16 Trevor Connelly LW
17 Igor Chernyshov LW
18 Adam Jiricek D
19 Beckett Sennecke RW
20 Sacha Boisvert C
21 Andrew Basha LW
22 Michael Hage C/RW
23 Ryder Ritchie C/RW
24 Aron Kiviharju D
25 Emil Hemming RW
26 Nikita Artamonov LW
27 Terik Parascak RW
28 Jett Luchanko C
29 Charlie Elick D
30 Alfons Freij D
31 Cole Hutson D
32 Cole Beaudoin C
33 Lucas Pettersson c
34 John Mustard C
35 Leo Shalin Wallenius D
36 EJ Emery D
37 Henry Mews D
38 Stian Solberg D
39 Teddy Stiga LW
40 Adam Jecho RW
41 Matvei Gridin LW
42 Dominik Badinka D
43 Dean Letourneau C
44 Tanner Howe LW
45 Maxim Masse RW
46 Marek Vanacker LW
47 Luke Misa C
48 Matvei Shuravin D
49 Tomas Galvas D
50 Jesse Pulkkinen D
