NHL draft 2024 surprises

[alko]

Tomas Galvas, ranked as the second round player in most rankings, wasnt selected.

Aron Kiviharju - 2 years ago -> sure Nr 1 pick. Drafted in 4. round.

Any other surprises?

Click to read more...

 

[Hockeyville USA]

Ben Danford going in the 1st was a major surprise to me

 

[CaptainShark]

Buium falling as far as he did caught me off guard.

Chernyshov having to wait for day 2 was a surprise as well.

Isles of all teams picking Eiserman and Pulkkinen

 

[Castle8130]

Seattle taking Catton 8 over 4 really good defensemen on the board. I don't dislike Catton, but Seattle was the team I least expected to draft him in the 6-12 range.

As noted above Buium falling so far

Colorado starting the goalie Avalanche at 38 with a double overager (really liked him btw)

Parascak and Boisvert in top 18 was a big shocker

 

[saintunspecified]

Isles of all teams picking Eiserman and Pulkkinen

Isles taking 2 USNDT players, a Finnish player, and a couple of european goalies isn't any surprise to Islanders fans. Not that we've had huge successes with that formula, but it's not a surprise.

 

[Anarchynate]

Masse falling to the 3rd

 

[Hinterland]

Biggest surprise was Simon Zether, a towering but smooth skating Centerman, falling all the way to the last pick of the 4th round. Absolutely destroyed the J20 in Sweden and was an impact player for Rögle's SHL team. Helped them turn their season around after the firing of the Abbott's. Played increased minutes during Rögle's playoff run. Their high energy 4th line was a big reason why they did not lose a single playoff game until the final.

There are no holes in Zether's game. As mature as it gets for a draft eligible player. Very intense, very physical and he has yet to fill out, is therefore only gonna get better. I'd say he's 2nd best two way forward of his draft class. Very good at breaking up plays. His high hockey IQ allows him to evaluate/calculate where the puck is gonna go faster than pretty much everybody else. That was visible even at the highest level of European pro hockey.

Only downside is that he hasn't played and scored much for most of the season. His regular season average TOI was very low. He did play and score a lot in the J20 but was mostly up with the big club. Apparently will be playing Allsvenskan next season which shows he's a smart kid as well willing to take a step back in order to improve. He's proven more than good enough to play SHL but, especially after not playing much last season, it's gonna be important for him to play Center and big minutes in all situations. A strong SHL squad like Rögle was most certainly unable to guarantee him that large of a role.

To summarize. Florida getting a mid first round kinda talent with the last pick of the 4th round was an absolute shocker for me.

Other shockers include the Avs picking a small triple overager this early (with all other goalies going much later) plus the downfalls of Kiviharju and Misa as well as Galvas and Ustinkov going undrafted.

Personally I'm shocked about the 2nd and 3rd overall picks as well but those have been predicted by many so perhaps I shouldn't have been surprised. Still can't make sense of those picks though.

Lots of smaller surprises as well. A pretty wild draft compared to others I feel.

 

[Arthur Morgan]

Beckett Sennecke going 3rd overall was pretty surprising, I seen the reports but I didnt think they would actually do it.
in one of my leagues he went 16th overall and in the other he went 15th overall then in one other I keep tabs on but am not a part of anymore he went 14th overall.
seemed like quite the jump. but then again last year I took Simashev at like 27th and he went 6th overall. just didnt expect it for a top 3 pick

 

[f7ben]

I think easily the biggest surprise was how sober Bill Guerin appeared and the decisive lack of deep red hue in his face

 

[Brodeur]

Beckett Sennecke going 3rd overall was pretty surprising, I seen the reports but I didnt think they would actually do it.
in one of my leagues he went 16th overall and in the other he went 15th overall then in one other I keep tabs on but am not a part of anymore he went 14th overall.
seemed like quite the jump. but then again last year I took Simashev at like 27th and he went 6th overall. just didnt expect it for a top 3 pick

Just for the excuse to talk about fantasy leagues, ours awards the #12 pick to the playoff winner. But since we do our draft before the real one and EDM/FLO went long, I had to share the pick with the other finalist.

We had 11 of the same top 12, so we agreed to just take whoever was left; Our mismatch was that he had Helenius and I had Sennecke. I spent several days trying to get him to include Sennecke with the rumors swirling that he was going in the top 6. Thankfully somebody grabbed Sennecke at #11 and it wasn't a last minute debate.

------------

I attended the draft and it was a fantastic time. Part of the fun is shouting out guesses with the rest of the peanut gallery. When Anaheim was on the clock, I told the surrounding folks that there was smoke about Sennecke going which bought me some cred when it happened. Also mentioned Jett Luchanko going higher than most rankings a few minutes before the Flyers took him.

It's funny, I tell myself teams don't draft for need but then I'm immediately a prisoner in the moment. I was surprised Utah/Seattle passed on D and then naturally Utah trades for Sergachev/Marino the next day while Seattle seemingly is signing Montour today.

 

[Xirik]

Just for the excuse to talk about fantasy leagues, ours awards the #12 pick to the playoff winner. But since we do our draft before the real one and EDM/FLO went long, I had to share the pick with the other finalist.

We had 11 of the same top 12, so we agreed to just take whoever was left; Our mismatch was that he had Helenius and I had Sennecke. I spent several days trying to get him to include Sennecke with the rumors swirling that he was going in the top 6. Thankfully somebody grabbed Sennecke at #11 and it wasn't a last minute debate.

------------

I attended the draft and it was a fantastic time. Part of the fun is shouting out guesses with the rest of the peanut gallery. When Anaheim was on the clock, I told the surrounding folks that there was smoke about Sennecke going which bought me some cred when it happened. Also mentioned Jett Luchanko going higher than most rankings a few minutes before the Flyers took him.

It's funny, I tell myself teams don't draft for need but then I'm immediately a prisoner in the moment. I was surprised Utah/Seattle passed on D and then naturally Utah trades for Sergachev/Marino the next day while Seattle seemingly is signing Montour today.

did someone ask you if you were a scout or part of the NHL?

 

[Brodeur]

did someone ask you if you were a scout or part of the NHL?

Maybe if I had worn a suit to the draft. But it was a blast being there with a bunch of nerdy fans. The Habs fans in front of me were cheering the #2-4 picks because they wanted Demidov. I had fun high fiving them when they got their guy.

 

[Xirik]

View attachment 890796

Maybe if I had worn a suit to the draft. But it was a blast being there with a bunch of nerdy fans. The Habs fans in front of me were cheering the #2-4 picks because they wanted Demidov. I had fun high fiving them when they got their guy.

I didn't see you talk much about the side things at the draft. get any autographs or meet with more players/coaches?

 

[Brodeur]

I didn't see you talk much about the side things at the draft. get any autographs or meet with more players/coaches?

The draft floor was pretty well separated from the stands, so autographs/photos were a little bit more difficult this time around. Got a picture/autograph from Anton Silayev as he was hanging out in the lobby after the first round was over. Had a quick conversation/picture with (Winnipeg pick) Kevin He on the second day. My buddy (Kings fan) got a picture of his kid with Liam Greentree on Day 2. If I were there solo, I might have loitered around a bit longer after Day 1 but we had to grab food for my friend's kid. Plus Day 2 being at 8:30am was rough, I felt like a dweeb getting to sleep early on a perfectly good Friday night in Vegas.

Didn't want to bother them, but walked by LeBrun/Dreger/Button and exchanged acknowledgement nods. Saw Button talking with Dale Hunter. Claude Lemieux was sitting like 10 seats to my right during the first round. The Buium brothers were with a buddy checking into Treasure Island at the same time I was; I might have been tempted to start a conversation but my card got initially declined since the bank assumed it was a fraudulent charge.

I went to the Awards show on Thursday. Most of the players understandably didn't want to interact with the fans, but Sergei Bobrovsky was happily taking photos with people afterwards. I ran into Michael Hage in the lobby and wished him luck; I had a brainfart and thought he was Zayne Parekh, good thing I didn't say "Congrats on the Memorial Cup" which would have been awkward. Joe Sakic was behind me on the escalator out of the venue. Overheard him telling somebody something like "It's fair that the host was making fun of the players for being so stiff. But I was like that too."

 

[Sombastate]

While I think Luchanko should be a fine player, I think clearly that was a big surprise and I think it could ultimately be the first of a line of mistakes that get Danny fired.

 

[Brodeur]

While I think Luchanko should be a fine player, I think clearly that was a big surprise and I think it could ultimately be the first of a line of mistakes that get Danny fired.

We'll see, Bob McKenzie left some bread crumbs about Luchanko going higher than where he was being ranked. Other publications were giving Luchanko some late love as well, HockeyProspect.com had him ranked #12 and I've enjoyed their list in recent years. So it wasn't too surprising unless folks were married to Central Scouting or The Hockey News list which haven't been the best in recent memory.

Bob McKenzie's Final NHL Draft Ranking: Many attractive and diverse options after Macklin Celebrini | TSN

This year’s final ranking, from No. 2 on, is much more challenging to assemble because of two factors - many more divergent opinions and variance on even the top 10 picks and two Russians forcing their way into the conversation in the upper echelon.

www.tsn.ca

Apropos of nothing, one name in our Top 32 that seems to be generating a lot of final week buzz: Guelph Storm centre Jett Luchanko. He’s No. 19, but several scouts told us they feel he’s picking up momentum as we head towards Friday’s draft. Someone to keep an eye on.

 

[BoHorvat 53]

Parekh going before Buium was a bit surprising to me - I thought Buium is the best defenseman in this class and see him turning out to be a #1 defenseman at a decently high clip, especially compared to Parekh (Although Parekh's ceiling is higher)

 

[Byron Bitz]

Kiviharju going so late was a big surprise. Beckett at 3OA and the late first had some surprising names like O’Rielly, Danford, Gridin and Surin