After a strong 2013 NHL Entry Draft, the 2014 edition had a big act to follow to keep the talent pipelines flowing. Done away with one or two-player hype machines of years past, the 2014 draft provided us with a four-horse race, with the likes of Sam Bennett, Leon Draisaitl, Sam Reinhart and the exceptional Aaron Ekblad. This draft was also notable for the amount of draft-eligible players who were sons or nephews of former players and managers such as Ryan MacInnis, Ryan Donato and William Nylander. Grab a coffee and have a look though the 2014 draft, ten years on!
35 comments
“Why the Sabres will be tremendous by the end of the decade” and it’s next to a giant picture of Tim Murray
Of all the years we finally decided to pick someone in our own backyard, it had to be Jake Virtanen 🤦♂️
It’s just agonizing how the team decided to pick a guy who was bullying around other players on the ice because of his size. Hockey IQ just so fucking bad and while the skill was decent was not worth passing on Nylander or Ehlers. I knew he skates fast but pick Ehlers then since he actually skilled his way to his rank.
Brayden Point at 42 lol
Really sad Honka never panned out (would have been an all-time great hockey name). Luckily, the Finnish defenseman we selected in the first round a few years later turned out much better
They were spot on with Larks.
Ehlers <3
Crazy how all 4 of them were on the ice during the Cup Final
There was a clear top 4 in this draft and besides Ekblad who was pretty much a number one lock they could have gone in any order. In hindsight obviously Draisaitl is the guy here but a massive miss on Pastrnak here. This draft has produced some of the best players in the league right now.
Top three are Draisaitl, Pastrnak and Point in a redraft?
Why haven’t other teams tried having 3 of the 4 top picks on their team to win the cup? Are they stupid?
Not a single Rinat Valiev to be seen in the top 100.
Wow they were not high on Kempe huh?
Vancouver really dropped the ball on this draft. Thank god we got Demko at least
Taking Connor fucking Bleakley 2 picks ahead of Pastrnak when we needed a scoring winger prospect in the system anyway is going to piss me off until the day I die.
Just force either him or Rants to play LW instead and we could’ve had a top line of Rantanen/Mackinnon/Pastrnak. Filthy.
Lol Point was #42 here. And then in the actual draft, the Lightning had pick #80, Yzerman called Minnesota to trade up to #79, and then selected Point at #79. Rest is history.
They have the top 4 guys in the wrong order.
I always forget Pasta and Nylander were once teammates.
They definitely didn’t care enough to put the right pins on the Czech maps.
“Just put it somewhere in the middle, no one’s gonna know”
They didn’t get Prague and they absolutely didn’t get Pasta’s Havirov.
Islanders came out of this with dalcolle and hosang. Yikes
That’s a good draft class.
So many incredible names and Ron Francis really forced the canes to draft Haydn Fleury
Another day another half hour at work spent reading these
A goalie that was picked 118th in that draft not even mentioned.
But damn that’s a good draft
And the top 3 won
Zito must have had a subscription
I distinctly remember when I was drafting for my dynasty league that year, I had 9 and 15 and I had zeroed in on Fiala and Pasta because of the positive way Draft Twitter had been talking about them. Needless to say I was STOKED that I landed both lol, Pasta turned out to be even better than advertised and Fiala has been a very solid top 6 forward.
(sadly that core didn’t quite pan out due to me sitting on my damn hands too long and i had to move them on, but i got good value for both.)
Fucking Dal Colle.
Nikita Scherbak…
God I crave to be in the universe where he panned out. Too bad he didn’t have the right mindset and was drafted by an organization that seemingly had complete disdain for young developing players.
Nick Ritchies evaluations were damning and accurate. Not sure wtf Bob Murray was thinking!
Bennett with head full of hair and no facial hair is more shocking than his ranking
They were clearly wrong about Draisaitl. He’s a second line centre
Dynamic point producer is the term of 2014
Damn, I’ve never heard of Chart Toppers before, must have been a bust
Definitely an all time draft fail by Jim Benning. So many great players available and he just couldn’t help himself
I have been loving these posts but this one takes the cake. Lots of big names, solid top 4, all entering/in their prime now so their skill is fresh in your mind.