Outside of The Windy City, the happiest folks in the NHL have to be in the league offices. The next big marketable star will not be starting his games at 10:00 PM EST, instead it looks like Connor Bedard will be starting his career in the third largest TV market in the United States.
The Chicago hockey team cashed in on their 11.5% odds and leapfrogged the Anaheim Ducks and Columbus Blue Jackets to secure the first overall selection in the 2023 NHL Draft, and with that the right to draft Connor Bedard. For the ‘Hawks it will be the first time since 2007 that they will be drafting first overall. That year they took Patrick Kane. This year they’ll likely draft Kane’s successor.
While fans in Anaheim are likely bummed out at not getting Bedard, they will have a decent consolation prize in Dylan Duke’s teammate at the University of Michigan, Adam Fantilli. The 18-year-old put up 65 points (30 goals, 35 assists) in 36 games for the Wolverines and added another 5 points (2 goals, 3 assists) in 7 games for Team Canada at the Men’s Under-20 World Juniors in January.
Columbus drops to the third spot and will have to choose between three offensive studs in Matvei Michkov, Leo Carsson, or Will Smith. Those three are unlikely to hit the NHL next season, but project to be top-six forwards within a few seasons. For a Blue Jackets team that has a decent roster when it’s not beset by injuries, having a talented playmaker coming around in a few seasons would be a nice addition.
The rest of the selections went chalk without anyone jumping up or down in their draft spots. Arizona receives the 12th overall pick from the Ottawa Senators as a result of the Jakob Chychrun trade at the deadline this season.
Lightning / NHL / Hockey News
Bolts Brew Fest returns to Amalie Arena this summer [Creative Loafing]
More than 50 breweries are expected to serve their various ales and lagers on August 11th in the 6th annual Bolts Brew Fest.
Crunch eliminated in dramatic Game 5 [Raw Charge]
The final Crunch Wrap featuring live action of the season. Lee wraps things up as the Crunch drop Game 5 against the Rochester Americans.
Columbus to draft third [The Cannon]
As our friends over at The Cannon point out, not only did Blue Jackets’ fans get their hopes dashed, they found out in a less than dramatic fashion as ESPN announced their pick order before the card was revealed and the broadcast rushed to a commercial. Flawless.
Vancouver fined for violating offseason training rules [Daily Face Off]
Pretty impressive that the Canucks managed to violate offseason training rules while half the league was still playing. Apparently from April 17th-23rd, there were skating sessions involving six players that were led by development coaches, Henrik and Daniel Sedin. Since members of the coaching staff were involved, that’s a big no-no according to the CBA. The orginzation was fined $50,000 (Canadian) and warned that fines would increase if they did it again.
Afterwords: Mirror Image [Defending Big D]
Jake Oettinger struggled and Miro Heiskanen took a puck to the face, knocking him out of the game, a 7-2 loss for the Dallas Stars. It’s the second one that could be a concern for the Stars moving forward.
Ten overagers who could be selected in this year’s draft [The Hockey News]
You know who likes to draft overagers? The Tampa Bay Lightning. Could one of these 10 players end up being the 188th (I think my math is right on that) pick?
Tomas Tatar fined $5,000 for high-stick [NHL.com]
The New Jersey Devils forward was assessed the maximum fine after he high-sticked Sebastian Aho in Game 3.
Vegas Golden Knights 5-1 over Edmonton Oilers [Vegas leads 2-1]
Things started off well for Edmonton as Warren Foegele scored less than three minutes into the game. From then on it was all Vegas. Old friend Jonathan Marchessault scored twice in the first. Zach Whitecloud, Jack Eichel, and Chandler Stephenson scored in the second to provide the winning margin.
It wasn’t all positive news for the Golden Knights as starting goaltender Laurent Brossoit had to be helped off the ice following this play: