The biggest organizational need for each team in the top 10 of the 2024 NHL Draft

May 10, 2024

The biggest organizational need for each team in the top 10 of the 2024 NHL Draft

Credit: Kamil Krzaczynski-USA TODAY Sports

We now know which teams will pick where in the top 10 of the 2024 NHL Draft.

Tuesday’s draft lottery didn’t actually change anything in the order. The San Jose Sharks remained at No. 1, Chicago stayed at No. 2, and everyone below them held their original spots.

Daily Faceoff‘s Steven Ellis already put together his post-lottery mock draft on Wednesday. Today, we’re going to take a step back and look at things on more of an abstract level, and ask: What do these teams need?

The concept of drafting for need is typically frowned upon around the NHL. You hear the adage all the time: Pick the best player available. In some instances, a team’s need lines up with the BPA. In many others, it doesn’t.

Keeping that in mind, here’s a look at the biggest organizational need for each of the teams picking in the top 10 of this year’s draft.

San Jose Sharks: Macklin Celebrini (but also defense)

The Sharks have a solid group of young forwards that includes Will Smith, William Eklund, Quentin Musty, David Edstrom, Filip Bystedt, Collin Graf, and Thomas Bordeleau. Sharks GM Mike Grier now has the easiest decision in the world to make with the No. 1 pick this year after winning the draft lottery on Tuesday. Adding someone like Macklin Celebrini to that collection of guys in San Jose should work wonders. But it’s worth noting just how badly the Sharks also need to find a way to secure a top defense prospect in this year’s draft. Beyond Shakir Mukhamadullin, who came to the Sharks in the Timo Meier deal and played in his first three NHL games last season, the Sharks don’t have a ton of high-end defense prospects in their system. Jack Thompson, Luca Cagnoni, and Henry Thrun all have potential, but it’ll be interesting to see whether the Sharks are able to nab another defender with the No. 14 overall pick that they got from the Pittsburgh Penguins in the Erik Karlsson trade. Someone like Carter Yakemchuk or Adam Jiricek would make a fair amount of sense in that range.

Chicago Blackhawks: Everything?

The Blackhawks weren’t a particularly strong team before they tore their entire roster down to the studs in their successful pursuit of Connor Bedard. Now, it’s just a matter of building things back up, but that’s a whole lot easier said than done. To put it kindly, Chicago needs a little bit of everything. Alex Vlasic and Kevin Korchinski have shown some promise on the blueline, but they’ll need a whole lot more back there if they even want to sniff the playoffs, let alone actual Stanley Cup contention. Up front, Bedard can’t do it all by himself. Frank Nazar, Oliver Moore, Lukas Reichel, and Philipp Kurashev are all solid young forwards, but again — they need more. It’ll be worth watching to see whether Chicago elects to speed things up a little with some splashy UFA signings over the next few years, but considering the drastic extent to which the Blackhawks gutted their roster, it might be in their best interests to stay in the basement for a little while until they can accumulate the assets they need to build a legitimate core group around Bedard.

Anaheim Ducks: Even more defensemen

The Ducks have long been regarded as one of the league’s top defensemen factories, churning out the likes of Hampus Lindholm, Cam Fowler, Sami Vatanen, Josh Manson, and more recently Shea Theodore and Marcus Pettersson, but they’ve got a bit of a void to fill after trading Jamie Drysdale to the Philadelphia Flyers back in January. With Leo Carlsson, Cutter Gauthier, Mason McTavish, Troy Terry, and Trevor Zegras now forming an enviable nucleus at forward, the Ducks have both the need and the wherewithal to focus on building out their group of young defensemen. The good news: Pavel Minytukov, Olen Zellweger, Tristan Luneau, and Jackson LaCombe have all shown promise already in their burgeoning pro careers. Imagine slotting someone like Artyom Levshunov or Anton Silayev into a group like that.

Columbus Blue Jackets: Linemates for Adam Fantilli

The Blue Jackets are a team in desperate need of a fresh start, particularly after a 2023–24 season that was doomed from the start (the less said about Mike Babcock’s tenure as head coach, the better). Adam Fantilli embodies the new wave of talent on the rise in Columbus, although he could use a bit more help as he continues to progress as a pro. Kirill Marchenko, Dmitri Voronkov, and Yegor Chinakhov are all impressive young wingers forging paths for themselves in the NHL, but it’s hard to say whether any of them will slot in next to Fantilli on a long-term basis. Johnny Gaudreau is coming off a 12-goal season and turns 31 this summer. With a strong defensive prospect pool that already includes David Jiricek, Denton Mateychuk, Stanislav Svozil, and Corson Ceulemans, and two other good young centers in Kent Johnson and Cole Sillinger, it’d be neat to see the Blue Jackets add a top-flight winger prospect this year. What if the Blackhawks and Ducks both opt for defenders and Ivan Demidov falls to Columbus at No. 4? That’d be something.

Montreal Canadiens: Elite forward prospects

The Habs took an unexpected swing on David Reinbacher with the No. 5 overall pick in last year’s draft. It raised more than a few eyebrows around the league, particularly considering that top-rated Russian forward Matvei Michkov was still available at that spot (he ended up going to Philadelphia at No. 7). In any event, the Canadiens now have a pretty decent group of young defenders that includes Reinbacher, Kaiden Guhle, Lane Hutson, Arber Xhekaj, Logan Mailloux, and Justin Barron. It’d be a nice change of pace to see Montreal elect for a high-skill forward with the No. 5 pick this time around. With Juraj Slafkovsky developing into a fearsome power forward before our very eyes in the second half of the 2023–24 season, the Canadiens could probably afford to take a gamble on a smaller center with enormous upside like Berkly Catton. But what about another giant like Cayden Lindstrom to pair with Slafkovsky? The Atlantic Division might never be the same.

Utah HC: Defense, defense, defense

Utah general manager Bill Armstrong spent the past few years in Arizona assembling one of the most underrated groups of young forwards in the league. Led by Clayton Keller, the newly relocated Utah franchise also boasts Dylan Guenther, Logan Cooley, Matias Maccelli, Josh Doan, and Barrett Hayton, as well as prospects Conor Geekie and Daniil But. Where Utah really stands to improve is on defense, even after selecting Dmitri Simashev with the No. 6 pick in last year’s draft. With apologies to J.J. Moser, the unnamed Utah team does not currently have a top-pairing NHL defenseman on its roster. It’s possible that the Utah scouting staff (which carried over from Arizona) returns to the Russia well with the 6’7″ Silayev, who would fit right in with Armstrong’s philosophy of building with big defenders. But it’s also easy to envision Utah honing in on Sam Dickinson, a 6’3″ two-way defenseman who plays with a ton of poise.

Ottawa Senators: Literally anybody

C’mon, now. The Senators basically just need to get anybody good out of this pick. This is a team that didn’t pick until the fourth round last year despite coming off a sixth consecutive season outside the playoff picture. This year made it seven, but the Sens haven’t gotten that much closer to ending that drought at all. You have to go back to 2021 to see the last time Ottawa made a first-round pick — and even then, they used the No. 10 choice on Tyler Boucher, who has missed more games to injury than he’s played in the three years since. After flipping their 2022 and 2023 first-round picks in short-sighted moves for Alex DeBrincat and Jakob Chychrun, the Senators badly need to get back into a rhythm of drafting shrewdly and often. Regardless of whether they take a forward or a defenseman, it’s imperative that the Sens find the best player available at No. 7 overall.

Seattle Kraken: A true No. 1 defenseman

Given that they’ve only existed for three seasons, the Kraken understandably don’t have the strongest asset base. They also made a surprise playoff appearance in 2023, which was fun for the fans in Seattle but hampered the team’s draft stock that year. As a result, the Kraken are still pretty light on high-end young talent at both the forward and defense positions. But it’s also worth noting that the Kraken have used their first three first-round picks exclusively on forwards: Matty Beniers, Shane Wright, and Eduard Sale. The team also has Jagger Firkus, Carson Rekhopf, Ryan Winterton, and Jani Nyman waiting in the wings (no pun intended). But beyond Ryker Evans, Lukas Dragicevic, and Ty Nelson, there isn’t much to write home about in Seattle’s defensive prospect pool. This Kraken team would probably love to have Vince Dunn as its No. 2 defenseman going forward, but there’s no presumptive No. 1 currently in the pipeline. Seattle feels like a natural landing spot for someone like Zeev Buium, who is coming off an incredible run to the NCAA National Championship as Denver’s top defender.

Calgary Flames: Tij Iginla

The Flames are in an extremely unique position heading into this year’s draft. They’re coming off a pretty aggressive teardown and are looking for a central, unifying figure who can help them hit the reset button and lead a new core. Well, it just so happens that Tij Iginla, the middle child of the greatest player in franchise history, is available in this year’s draft — and most rankings have him right in the Flames’ wheelhouse with the No. 9 pick. He’s a skilled, feisty winger who exploded for 47 goals and 84 points in 64 games with the WHL’s Kelowna Rockets this past season. The Flames need so much more help than just Iginla — they could really use a top-line center and a first-pairing defense prospect — but it feels like a once-in-a-generation opportunity to get someone with that kind of pedigree and skillset at the No. 9 spot. (Well … it’s actually twice-in-a-generation: Joe Iginla, Tij’s younger brother, plays for the Edmonton Oil Kings and is draft-eligible in 2026).

New Jersey Devils: A healthy roster

These Devils have Jack Hughes, Nico Hischier, Jesper Bratt, Timo Meier, Dawson Mercer, Dougie Hamilton, Simon Nemec, Luke Hughes, and now Seamus Casey. This is a team that should be on the verge of contending for the Stanley Cup, not picking in the top 10. It’s not impossible that the Devils try to use this pick in a trade for more of a ‘win-now’ piece, but if they do end up drafting with it, they’ll be adding to a collection of young talent that rivals any other in the league. What New Jersey needs more than anything is for Hamilton and Jack Hughes to play full seasons next year. They also very much need a true starting goaltender, although they won’t be getting one of those in this draft. The most likely outcome for the Devils is that they pick whichever consensus top-10 prospect ends up falling to them — Cole Eiserman seems like a possibility here — and then run it back next year in a bid to return to the playoffs. They have the horses to finish very high in the Metropolitan Division.

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