They nailed it with Dahlin, the Hughes vs. Boqvist comparison seems pretty laughable at this point though.

39 comments

  2. Pretty good draft

    I’d probably go with Quinn Hughes at 1, followed by Tkachuk…but there’s a lot of variations that would be fine too

    Dahlin, Svechnikov, Dobson, Bouchard in the mix too

    Edit – a poster replied that I was crazy to have Tkachuk at 2, and they’re right. I was mindlessly thinking of Matthew.

    So the correction is probably to have the four D first, then Svechnikov and BRADY Tkachuk

  3. I think this was Ken Holland’s worst pick in drafting Zadina throughout his time with Detroit

  4. I love Quinn Hughes. The sequence of events that had to occur to fall to Vancouver is still so incredible. That top 4 of Dahlin, Svechnikov, Hughes, and Zadina seemed like it was set in stone all season until Montreal and Arizona decided they needed centers.

  5. Some of the best D in the league came from this draft. Looking back, as prospects, I think Bouchard/Hughes/Dobson should have been put with the first group with Tkachuk/Svechnikov.

    This draft is a bit harder to judge in hindsight because some players are still emerging.

  8. It’s hilarious to see Sokolov at 71. He didn’t even get picked in this draft or the next, he was a double overager when Ottawa grabbed him

  9. I wanted a Dman for the Sabres so bad for this one. It had been forward after forward and it was clear our rebuild 1.0 was faltering at this point. If they lost the lottery I was scared as hell they’d take Svech.

    After Dahlin I wanted Hughes, Dobson, then Bouchard, then maybe Boqvist (although I was never sold on him). I thought Bouchard might be another in a long line of “looks good in London” prospects and was a little leary on him. Watching Hughes college higlights was like watching people try to skate with Bobby Orr back in the 70’s, no one else on the ice could move like him.

  11. Is it just me or are hockey drafts the most watered down drafts of any major sport? Some drafts are bigger but there are so many top rated players that end up doing absolutely nothing.

  12. I wanted Dobson so bad and Bowman went with the worst of the lot there. A small, offensive dman with concussion issues before even being drafted..

  13. Is there anywhere or anybody that’s compiling these? Super fun to read all of these now, in 10 years they’ll be incredible.

  16. Shocked pikachu face Habs fan was totally right with Habs picking KK at 3. So, so, soooo dumb!

  17. There’s never been a draft I have deeply followed like this one. It was fun at the time…

  18. Strange, I thought that Ryan O’Reilly was older and probably better than a 100th prospect.

  19. Crazy how this was released a couple weeks before the draft and they had Kotkaniemi at 18 and he went 3rd overall

  22. It’s crazy how some of these guys are full timers in the NHL and some that were expected to be full timers aren’t. Like I’ve seen Curtis Douglas in Tucson for the Roadrunners and he’s mostly just there for a fight or two then that’s it. High hopes and little reward. Just the luck of the draft I guess

  26. I really thought Dahlin was going to be the McDavid of defensemen. He’s still absolutely top of the elite D in the league, but he was touted as generational for a while.

  28. As ever the THN draft rankings are much better than what NHL teams ultimately selected, but much less than drafting by NHLe alone

  30. While I’m sad we wasted the pick on Kotkaniemi.

    I’m also happy we did because the whole Carolina fiasco was pretty entertaining.

    Sometimes chaos is just as fun as results. And that’s why I liked Bergevin.

  31. Wild were lucky Dewar panned out (until he needed a raise, and ended up replacing him with Lauko)

  32. Thought to myself. Whoever picked Kotkaniemi at 3 was an idiot. Realized it was the Habs. Fuck.

  33. Surely its not the year we are reaching for a player way lower with a lot of questions around him

    Right? Right? 😭

    Kinda ironic that they seems to be praising kotkaniemei work ethic when the rumors say that he did not want to work on his flaws when in mtl

  34. TIL: Dahlin and I, a diehard Buffalo Sabres fan, have the same birth month and day. Its destiny

  35. It’s wild how few of those name I know at this point. Shows how difficult it is to make it in the show.

  36. Denisenko not working out really surprised me, he always looked so good when I saw him.

    Forwards in this draft are pretty stinky outside Svechnikov and Brady Tkachuk. And even then Brady is a bit overrated due to family…

  37. opening the 3rd page and seeing svech’s description start with “had an injury” is so svech.

  38. Somebody needs to fire that scout that said he’d pick Zadina second overall lol

    And what a terrible draft class. Literally 2/3 notable after the 35th rank.

  39. This is coming from a guy who’s watched zadina play and tried to force homer bias with he’s still young and what not but seeing his 2 points in 25 games sticks out in hindsight.

    Playing in Detroit you could tell he lacked IQ with certain decisions and what not. Sometimes skating into direct traffic whatever.

    It was very obvious to me especially watching his 44 goal highlight video in the QMJHL that he didn’t have it, the QMJHL is an easier league sure but it was more how he went about scoring his goals and what not.

    A lot fell right for Zadina that year where he looked like a guaranteed 30 goal scorer. I can tell you even in the AHL where he actually played decent his rookie year his shot was never anything special.

    Again a lot went right for him and it’s obvious why he’s now having a godforbid falling out of the NHL.

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