2025 NHL Draft Thread

[Pez68]

I love how I talk about there being a log jam upcoming (and one impacting Isaak) and THEN Phillips is dealt AND hawk beat reporters express a similar concern afterward AND I'm out of touch?

Delusion.

 

[WarriorofTime]

Leafs never won because their forwards are overrated and Matthews is more concerned about squeezing the last dollar of his team's cap every 3 years than actually winning. It is honestly amazing he doesnt get more heat for his contract shenangins.

Oilers went to game 7 of the finals last year any sane person would argue a starting goalie was 1000% a bigger issue than their defense.

Should we talk about all the success Nashville had with their 4 top pairing Dmen the last 20 years? Afterall how could a team that at one point had Timonen, Weber, Suter, Josi, Ellis, Ekholm, Jones, Subban, among others not win? Must have been one big problem front and center with those teams... How about that they lost to a Pittsburgh team who didnt even have a top pairing D in 2017?

Elite center depth > everything else.

Crosby-Malkin, Kopitar-Carter, Bergeron-Krejci (could have been Savard too if Matt Cooke wasnt a prick), Stamkos-Point, ROR-Schenn, Backstrom-Kuznetsov, MacKinnon-Kadri, Datsyuk-Zetterberg, Staal-BrindAmour,

You pretty much have to go back to our Hawks to find a cup winner without at least 2 great centers down the middle and that is the exception if anything, also considering Kane basically was the center for his own line.

Hawks won cups with out of position Sharp, Michal Handzus and Old man Brad Richards as nominally second line centers. Any “one size fits all” declaration is dumb. Sometimes you are stretching the definition of “elite” at which point you could point many great wingers those teams has too. Could say same about elite high end number 1 Defenseman. Do hawks have one right now? But the hawks have drafted a lot of kids with center experience in excess picks.

 

[ClydeLee]

Pittsburgh is the only team in how long to win without a strong #1 Dman. Maybe that's the biggest key? You need someone you can also trust on the ice late and in every single situation.

Center depth surely is strongly needed. But lack of depth at center has not been as universal as top dmen

 

[TLEH]

Pittsburgh is the only team in how long to win without a strong #1 Dman. Maybe that's the biggest key? You need someone you can also trust on the ice late and in every single situation.

Center depth surely is strongly needed. But lack of depth at center has not been as universal as top dmen

Pretty disrespectful to Letang honestly.

 

[ello]

Pretty disrespectful to Letang honestly.

It’s been a while but I don’t think Letang played in 2017

 

[TLEH]

It’s been a while but I don’t think Letang played in 2017

Ah my fault Clyde I thought you were just talking about in general. Yes Letang didn't play in 2017 at all in the playoffs.

 

[u2wojo]

Pretty disrespectful to Letang honestly.

This....prime Letang was one of the top 10-15 D in the league and one of the better offensive one's for sure.

 

[Mrfenn92]

This....prime Letang was one of the top 10-15 D in the league and one of the better offensive one's for sure.

He was talking about the penguins winning the cup when letang was out. Dumoulin and Haisney were the top 2 dmen

 

[Hawkaholic]

OHL is weaker than the past

I'm not so sure of this, I guess it depends how far back you go. But there has been an influx of talent over the last couple months with USHL,BCHL etc players coming in to the league making it much better than the past 5 or so years.

 

[TLEH]

I'm not so sure of this, I guess it depends how far back you go. But there has been an influx of talent over the last couple months with USHL,BCHL etc players coming in to the league making it much better than the past 5 or so years.

I was thinking like pre-COVID. 2010-2019 CHL era.

 

[Castle8130]

People saying "Bedard needs help, we need to draft a forward". Matthew Schaefer IS THE HELP. He is an offensive defenseman and I don't think we have any defenseman in our prospect pool that will be close to his talents. Him and Bedard on the power play would be awesome. Yeah, we probably should've drafted Demidov, but that's in the past. I don't like the odds of Hagens, Misa, or Martone becoming that significant partner for Bedard. Take the best player available Davidson (even if that ends up being a forward)!

 

[x Tame Impala]

“Should have drafted Demidov”

Lev is apparently looking good in the AHL and has continued his trajectory of doing so in increasingly difficult leagues.

I’m thrilled with the pick. Demidov wouldn’t be playing here this year anyway.

 

[WarriorofTime]

He was talking about the penguins winning the cup when letang was out. Dumoulin and Haisney were the top 2 dmen

Should mention that Tampa won a cup with stamkos out all but one game in the playoffs by same token.

I don’t think there’s a magic position combo to winning a cup. Just need a great all around team which tends to mean being strong in many areas.

Like wing always gets degraded to not important. Number 1 winger on Stanley Cup winners

2024 - Tkachuk
2023 - Stone
2022 - Rantanen/Landeskog
2021 - Kucherov
2020 - Kucherov
2019 - Tarasenko
2018 - Ovechkin
2017 - Guentzel/Kessel
2016 - Kessel
2015 - Kane/Hossa
2014 - Gaborik
2013 - Kane/Hossa

 

[MHO]

I don’t think there’s a magic position combo to winning a cup. Just need a great all around team which tends to mean being strong in many areas.

I'm with you here. But I think you need a core of at least 2 hall of fame level players and then 7 players total that could realistically make an all star team. Past that, you need a handful of guys who happily accept their roles. I don't think position matters all that much if you have that mix.

 

[Hawkaholic]

I was thinking like pre-COVID. 2010-2019 CHL era.

Yeah, I dont know, it's not the early to mid 2000s OHL, but I think the CHL is better today than it has been in over a decade at least.

 

[WarriorofTime]

Yeah, I dont know, it's not the early to mid 2000s OHL, but I think the CHL is better today than it has been in over a decade at least.

Maybe in next couple years but they bled out a lot of aged talent to ushl/ncaa over a good stretch of years. There was a time not long ago a lot of the top NTDP kids went to the ohl (most common regionally) after that stint but now they all go ncaa. And a good amount of Canadian kids going ncaa these days too.

With the rule change there could probably be a good migration back during junior years but we’ll see how many then move onto college once they turn 18. This season it’s been mostly non notable BCHL kids going to the QMJHL because it’s easier to make. Ushl hasn’t seen a ton of big in name transfers because they’re asking for big transfer money.

Right now the ohl might be the most “draft year” dominant it’s ever been.

 

[Hawkaholic]

Maybe in next couple years but they bled out a lot of aged talent to ushl/ncaa over a good stretch of years. There was a time not long ago a lot of the top NTDP kids went to the ohl (most common regionally) after that stint but now they all go ncaa. And a good amount of Canadian kids going ncaa these days too.

With the rule change there could probably be a good migration back during junior years but we’ll see how many then move onto college once they turn 18. This season it’s been mostly non notable BCHL kids going to the QMJHL because it’s easier to make. Ushl hasn’t seen a ton of big in name transfers because they’re asking for big transfer money.

Right now the ohl might be the most “draft year” dominant it’s ever been.

My guess is it will depend on the team they are on if they go to NCAA when they turn 18. If they are on a team like the Knights, Rangers, Spitfires (teams at the top of the league) I think they stick around, but if they are on a bottom feeder team you will see them leave for school. But some really good kids have come over since they announced the new rule. Blake Montgomery and Jack Pridham are examples I can think of.

 

[ColbyChaos]

Only Pens, TBL, and Wings (and maybe the Kings) had two great centers, combined not-so-surprisingly with Letang (arguably the weakest d-corps of the multiple Cup winners because of Crosby), Hedman, Lindstrom, and Doughty. All won multiple Cups. The Bruins underachieved, even with Chara. The others lacked great defense.

Leafs still don’t have a good defense, and Matthews underperforms in the playoffs.

Nashville was an outlier, because, you know, the Hawks were in their way when they were at their peak.

Edit: forgot about Vancouver, with Sedin and Kesler, but sub-optimal defense.

Nashville and the hawks played eachother only 3 times care to explain the other years then…they had Weber-Suter-Josi for a long time and then had Josi-Subban-Ekholm-Ellis as malkin infamously said “they had four Erik Karlsson’s”.

Also can’t discount how great Kuznetsov was before the drug issues same with Kadri becoming a top line caliber center, Staal was a 100pt player with the canes and Brindamour was still great back then as well.

Florida won without a Norris level d as did the the 09 and 17 pens the 06 canes, having two elite centers matters beyond all else.

But this is pointless this board will be pounding the table for Landon DuPont in 2 years anyway as Schaefer will suddenly not be seen as having the insane ceiling that people think he has now (same with Lev and all our other D prospects already)