The first round is in the books and it featured a barrage of trades along with the 30 players selected. Here I’ll take a quick look to see how I (and my sources) did in predicting tonight’s results. The first round is the easiest one to pick, but precise predictions (player X going at #X) are almost impossible. In the previous two drafts the best ratio has been Bob McKenzie in 2010 (6/30, I was one behind him that year and tied for first with him in 2011, going a measly 4/30). This year has produced lower results overall (here I’m considering TSN (Bob McKenzie), FC (Future Considerations), RLR (Red Line Report), HP (Hockey Prospects), ISS (International Scouting Service), THN (The Hockey News), McK (McKeen’s):
TSN 5/30
HP/FC/ISS/McK 2/30
RLR/Eye on the Sens 1/30
I didn’t include Corey Pronman’s picks from Hockey Prospectus as part of my rankings, but he wound up going 3/30.
The more important thing to look at is how many players selected to be drafted in the first round actually were. Last year I was tied with TSN for the most selections (25/30), while in 2010 I edged him out by one (26/30). This year Bob was once again the champ and I dropped down in the pack:
TSN 27/30
McK 26/30
RLR 25/30
Eye on the Sens/THN 24/30
ISS/FC/HP 22/30
Corey Pronman 20/30
There were no truly off-the-board selections in the sense that all players picked were considered first-rounders by at least one source. Tanner Pearson was the lowest ranked player taken, but he was not the only player with only one first-round pick (Jordan Schmaltz being the other). Henrik Samuelsson had the second least first-round selections with two.
The highest ranked players who were not selected were Matthew Finn (considered a first-rounder by everyone), Sebastien Collberg (only a second-rounder to HP), and Pontus Aberg (only a second-rounder to TSN). No other players are near their uniformity of ranking.
Here’s the recap of the first round (correct publications in brackets):
1. Edmonton, Nail Yakupov (everyone except HP)
2. Columbus, Ryan Murray (TSN)
3. Montreal, Alex Galchenyuk (n/a)
4. New York Islanders, Griffin Reinhart (HP, TSN)
5. Toronto, Morgan Rielly (n/a)
6. Anaheim, Hampus Lindholm (n/a)
7. Minnesota, Matt Dumba (n/a)
8. Pittsburgh (from Carolina), Derrick Pouliot (n/a)
9. Winnipeg, Jacob Trouba (THN, TSN)
10. Tampa Bay, Slater Koekkoek (n/a)
11. Washington, Filip Forsberg (n/a)
12. Buffalo, Mikhail Grigorenko (TSN, HP)
13. Dallas, Radek Faksa (FC)
14. Buffalo (from Calgary), Zemgus Girgensons (n/a)
15. Ottawa, Cody Ceci (n/a)
16. Washington, Tom Wilson (n/a)
17. San Jose, Thomas Hertl (n/a)
18. Chicago, Teuvo Teravainen (n/a)
19. Tampa Bay, Andrei Vasilevski (n/a)
20. Philadelphia, Scott Laughton (n/a)
21. Calgary (from Buffalo), Mark Jankowski (n/a)
22. Pittsburgh, Olli Maatta (n/a)
23. Florida, Mike Matheson (n/a)
24. Boston, Malcolm Subban (McK)
25. St. Louis, Jordan Schmaltz (n/a)
26. Vancouver, Brendan Gaunce (n/a)
27. Phoenix, Henrik Samuelsson (ISS)
28. New York Rangers, Brady Skjei (n/a)
29. New Jersey, Stefan Matteau (n/a)
30. Los Angeles, Tanner Pearson (n/a)
I’ll have a full recap of the draft tomorrow.
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