To think about Day Two of the NHL Entry draft I’ll try to make a connection with a common rite of passage, high school graduation. Whether you’re valedictorian or just barely managed to graduate there is always a little bit of butterflies as you wait for commencement. For many high school kids, its the first time they seriously ponder what life after high school may entail for them. The uncertainty can create a feeling of anxiety, excitement and accomplishment all wrapped into an event where you hurry up and wait for what seems like forever and then suddenly its all over and you have a diploma in your hand and your life is headed in a new direction. Imagine if you would, if you were at commencement and you were uncertain as to whether you’d graduate. Where you only know if you accomplished your goal if someone walks up to a podium and calls your name. You and I don’t go through that mixed series of emotions as you watch each general manager or scouting director move to the mic and then say “(insert team name here) are proud to select…” and then hope its your name that is called just so this agonizing wait can be over, which is unlike those of us that graduated as we know our names will be called that day. Just think how that must feel for the hundreds of draft hopefuls each year who make the trip to the draft where they wait on pins and needles as each pick is made. For some, that relief takes place and their name is called and they can rest easy (for a moment) but for others they wait in vain. Their name is not called and they turn to their families feeling empty and disappointed, wondering if they made the right choice about dedicating themselves to play the game. While you’ll hear the phrase “a dream come true” bandied about it can also be a humbling moment that can leave you really questioning yourself. It is sad that some will feel that level of disappointment but it is a part of the process and it happens each and every year.
If you’re fortunate enough to live near where the draft is located, you may have a large entourage of friends and family members with you to celebrate this great day. Imagine their feelings as they await anxiously for your name to be called as well, where they may make comments that only add to the pressure that the draft hopeful is already feeling. This typifies Day Two of the Entry Draft. The first day is relatively easy; the players amongst the first 30 selected in the 1st round have a very good idea their name will be called as its just a matter of who and when. Yet for many of the Day 2 players, it is whether your name is even called at all. Toss into that your own expectations, those of coaches, family members and perhaps outside advisers like an agent and you have a perfect storm of stress. If you’re fortunate enough to have your name called on draft day you not only feel relief but the exhilaration of a new challenge, a new team and a new direction. It has be immensely gratifying and the State of Hockey News would like to extend our congratulations to all of these draft hopefuls whether your name was called or not.
For the teams it is also a mix of emotions. Of hoping players that you like fall into your lap as you attempt to find gems that eluded the first round. There are plenty of great stories of late-round success; guys like Henrik Zetterberg (7th round, 210th Overall in 1999), Pavel Datsyuk (6th round, 171st Overall in 1998), Johan Franzen (3rd round, 97th Overall in 2004), and Jonathan Ericsson (9th round, 291st Overall in 2002) are all late round diamonds in the rough that have kept Detroit as one of the Western Conference’s elite teams. It vaulted the reputation of Hakan Andersson as one of the most shrewd evaluators of talent in the NHL and his successes speak for themselves. Late round gems can save teams a significant portion of space under the salary cap instead of forcing organizations to sign more expensive players via free agency to fill organizational holes. So while the later rounds certainly are a crap shoot, if a team can land a few quality players later in the draft it can be all the difference in being able to afford your star calibre talent. In fact, the Wild are a good example of this. If Minnesota had drafted better and was able to rely on a pipeline of young players developed internally perhaps it would not have had to have parted with Brent Burns. Certainly something to consider. The Wild would make a deal with its rival, the Vancouver Canucks by giving them their 3rd round and 4th round selections respectively (71st and 101st Overall) for their 2nd round pick (60th Overall). With that pick the Wild select…
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2nd Round (60th Overall) ~ From Vancouver
Left Wing – Mario Lucia ~ Wayzata Trojans (USHS-MN)
Height: 6’2″ Weight: 183lbs Shoots: Left
The Hockey News’ rank: 26th ISS rank: 46th HockeyProspect.com rank: 50th CSS rank: 34th North American (skaters)
2010-11 Stats: 24GP 25G 22A = 47pts 14 PIM’s
Talent Analysis: Lucia is a smooth skating winger who was one of the most talented players to play high school hockey in Minnesota last season. The Fairbanks, Alaska-native has great on-ice vision, soft hands which are equally effective passing the puck or rifling a shot on goal makes him a dangerous offensive threat whenever he’s on the ice. Even though he was one Minnesota’s premier prep talents, he did spend some time with the U.S. Team where he competed in the Four Nations Cup where he scored 3 goals in 7 games and that was a big reason scouts were able to overlook the fact he stayed around to play in his senior season and accept his strong NHL potential. Mario Lucia will take his game to the USHL this season but its not certain where he’ll go next although some believe he will go to his father’s alma mater, Notre Dame. Lucia’s shot has terrific velocity, very accurate and he has a wickedly quick release which is amongst the best in the draft. The Wayzata star has the ability to beat defenders 1-on-1 with excellent stickhandling or just raw speed which means he has the ability to create scoring chances by himself. He will need to add muscle to his lanky frame, and does not have a physical element to his game. Defensively he’s slightly above average but is at his best He projects to be Top 6 sniper at the NHL level. ISS compares him to Derek Stepan.
Our Take: If Lucia continues to develop and adds the appropriate strength to his NHL-sized frame he could truly be the gem of the 2011 draft for the Wild. He has the speed, scoring ability the organization sorely needs. Lucia is no stranger to pressure, being the son of Golden Gophers’ head coach Don Lucia but now he will have the weight of the State of Hockey added to those somewhat frail shoulders of his and it will be interesting to see how well he handles it. He certainly has the potential to be the future franchise scorer the organization has missed since it let Marian Gaborik go via free agency but Lucia is still a few years away. I give Wild General Manager Chuck Fletcher some credit for making a deal to select Mario Lucia as he may be just enough to keep this draft from being a complete waste of an opportunity. I am normally not a big fan of drafting Minnesota high school talent but at least the Wild picked a guy who best fits the needs of the organization. My only question is, why did it take until the 2nd round for them to try to fill their most obvious need?
http://youtube.com/watch?v=OqfZUP4VGwA
5th Round (131st Overall)
Defenseman – Nick Seeler ~ Eden Prairie Eagles (USHS-MN)
Height: 6’0″ Weight: 170lbs Shoots: Left
The Hockey News’ rank: n/a ISS rank: n/a HockeyProspect.com rank: n/a CSS rank: n/a
2010-11 Stats: 28GP 9G 34A = 43pts 48 PIM’s
Talent Analysis: Described as a smooth skating two way defenseman with some ok offensive skills and an element of nastiness to his game the Minnesota prep star is heading to the USHL next season to play for the Muskegon Lumberjacks of the USHL. Seeler then will take his game to the University of Nebraska-Omaha to play for legendary coach Dean Blais. Seeler has an element of dangle to his game as the YouTube clip below will show you. He makes smart simple plays in his own zone and is good at making an effective outlet pass and in the offensive zone he has a knack for putting shots on goal despite traffic near the crease. A long term project, Seeler has all of the skills that make one believe he has NHL potential if he continues to develop and improve.
Our Take: I have to admit, this was a pick that left me a bit frustrated. The team’s obvious need is at forward and there is a definite log jam at defense yet the Wild felt compelled to draft another mobile two-way blueliner. The fact Seeler wasn’t rated by any major scouting service is also a concern and while he appears to be Division I bound to a solid program in Nebraska-Omaha it still makes me wonder why the team decided to add another defenseman who has only played at the high school level. Couldn’t the Wild have waited to draft Seeler later? Why make such a big off-the-board reach so early? Wouldn’t it made more sense to draft an offensive talent like Kelowna’s Shane McColgan or a big nasty defenseman like Baie-Comeau’s Samuel Noreau (brother of former Wild farmhand Maxim Noreau) instead as they were both available?
http://youtube.com/watch?v=R0EcCBRJ3Rg
6th Round (161st Overall)
Goaltender – Stephen Michalek ~ Loomis-Chaffee (USHS-CT)
Height: 6’2″ Weight: 183lbs Catches: Right
The Hockey News’ rank: n/a ISS rank: 15th (goalies) HockeyProspect.com rank: n/a CSS rank: 5th North American (goalies)
2010-11 Stats: 23GP 3-20-2 3.95GAA .918%SP
Talent Analysis: Stephen Michalek is no stranger to a heavy workload. While playing for the Eastern prep school Loomis-Chaffee he had to endure being on a terrible team that struggled to score goals and thus leaned heavily on their big-bodied butterfly goalie to bail them out. The Glastonbury, Connecticut native used to take shots from Los Angeles Kings goaltender Jonathan Quick as a 10-year old kid and has looked up to the NHL’er ever since. Michalek was selected to be a backup goaltender with the U.S. U-18 Team, and will be joining the Harvard Crimson next fall. One of the skills Michalek prides himself on, which he says was honed through years playing for some of the best hockey programs in Connecticut is his ability to find the puck through traffic and make saves even with a host of players camping near his crease. As bad as his school was, Michalek usually gave them a chance to win the game most nights as his .918 save percentage demonstrates. He has prototypical NHL goalie size and his is technically sound as he squares up to shooters well and gives them few windows to shoot at.
Our Take: Another bizarre selection in my opinion. The Wild are absolutely loaded at goaltender with Matt Hackett, Dennis Endras, Darcy Kuemper and Johan Gustafsson in the system it seems wasteful to draft another one. They have other big bodied goaltenders so Michalek’s frame doesn’t make him stand out amongst his peers. Also, it seems strange to draft yet another high school player. Whether you’re talking about the NBA or the NHL, the chances a player drafted out of high school makes it to the big league is extremely remote, so why draft 3 high school players in the same draft. I could understand one, or perhaps two if you have a lot of picks but 3 out of your six selections are prep stars? Yikes. Are we really supposed to believe Michalek’s potential is greater than Plymouth’s Matt Mahalak who was the #3 goaltender according to International Scouting Service who was still available when the Wild made their selection?
7th Round (191st Overall)
Center – Tyler Graovac ~ Ottawa 67’s (OHL)
Height: 6’3″ Weight: 179lbs Shoots: Right
The Hockey News‘ rank: n/a ISS rank: n/a HockeyProspect.com rank: 159th CSS rank: 120th
2010-11 Stats: 66GP 10G 11A = 21pts 10 PIM’s -4
Talent Analysis: A hard working centerman with good size, Graovac is still a very raw prospect but has shown some glimpses of being a potential power forward or checking line center. While his statistics do not shine all that bright; he accomplished what he did playing in limited role for the 67’s. The YouTube clip below demonstrates he has some ok ability to dangle the puck and likes to play near the crease where he can use his soft hands to their greatest effect. Like most young players he must add more strength which will hopefully make his first steps more explosive as well as making him physically able to handle the wear and tear of playing in a checking role.
Our Take: Graovac reminds me a lot of a lesser skilled Brett Bulmer minus the nastiness. Needless to say his chances of making the NHL are remote at best. He is not the type of player that will morph into a 1st or 2nd line talent, but if he can become a serviceable 4th liner you probably feel like you made a great pick. Even playing in a limited role, you would expect a player with his size to have accumulated more than 10 minutes in penalties and that makes you question if he has enough fiestiness to his game to be an effective checking center.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RTvwSRjDw_8&w=425&h=350]Our Overall Assessment of the 2011 Entry Draft for the Wild: I really hope I’m wrong, but based on the team’s needs and projected potential of those the team drafted I’d give this draft a C- / D+ at this point. I am extremely disappointed the Wild did not address their greatest organizational need in terms of adding fast, goal-scoring forwards to their pool of prospects. The only player the Wild selected that even came close to addressing this need was Mario Lucia, but you don’t address your greatest need with the 3rd selection of the draft in my opinion. Zack Phillips has great hands, but skating is huge in the NHL. If you can’t skate you don’t last long, just ask Mark Parrish if you need proof of that. The Wild’s team speed has steadily declined the last 5 seasons and for an organization that wants to play up-tempo hockey you can’t do that unless your skaters have the speed to make it happen. Phillips is very slow, and while he found ways to be effective in junior playing for an absolutely loaded team in Saint John how much slower will he appear to be at the NHL level where players move much faster? I am not hopeful. As for the team’s first pick (and to a lesser extend its 4th pick), Jonas Brodin (and Nick Seeler) I question the sanity of the Wild scouting staff in selecting the kind of player the team already has in abundance; that being a non-physical puck moving ‘two-way’ defenseman that doesn’t score a lot of points. At the very least if the team was unhappy with its rather large stable of defensive prospects, at least select a defenseman with an element of nastiness with an emphasis on physicality which really is something that group lacks as a whole. The Stanley Cup Finals should’ve provided the Wild an excellent example of how physical blueliners can stymie a dynamic offense as the Bruins’ blueline stonewalled the Canucks’ skilled attack. Physical blueliners Johnny Boychuk, Adam McQuaid, Zdeno Chara and Dennis Seidenberg absolutely punished Vancouver forwards all series long and the result was the team could very rarely work its cycling game which has been its bread and butter for years. Before the draft the Wild blueline was relatively soft, with the lone exception of Clayton Stoner and now with the trade of Brent Burns the team’s defense is now yogurt soft. If the team had to have a blueliner it should’ve selected the big and nasty Duncan Siemens or if it wanted offense to replace the loss of Burns it should’ve chosen Ryan Murphy or Nathan Beaulieu. The team drafted Brodin far too early and should’ve looked to have traded down if it was possible and at this point this was the draft’s biggest disappointment. Brodin may be a reasonable NHL’er but I don’t think he’ll become the type of dynamic two-way talent Burns was nor will he be the physical shutdown force the team’s defense could certainly use. Is this finally an admission that Tyler Cuma (who has a near identical skill set and body type to Brodin) is a complete bust? On a more positive note, I was pleased the Wild didn’t wait and draw out the drama over whether to trade Brent Burns or not, but why couldn’t they have used Burns to get a better 1st round pick than 28th Overall? I wonder if the team will regret tossing away another 2nd round pick for next year’s draft. Devin Setoguchi should help the Wild’s offense considerably and Chase Coyle appears to be a very promising power forward yet the draft selections by themselves left a lot to be desired from this fan’s perspective.
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