When Steve Yzerman was named general manager of the Detroit Red Wings, just about every Red Wings fan celebrated the move.
The hope is that Yzerman can rebuild the team into a Stanley Cup contender and dominating the NHL Draft will be a key to making that happen.
While browsing Twitter for some literature on Yzerman’s draft history, I stumbled across a well-written piece by Mark Falkner of the Detroit News titled, “‘No stone unturned’: Steve Yzerman’s Tampa Bay blueprint gives Red Wings fans hope.”
In the piece, Falkner ranked Yzerman’s top 5 NHL Draft picks from his time as GM of the Tampa Bay Lightning.
Nation, has Yzerman already made some picks with the Red Wings that will eventually be on this list?
1. Center Nikita Kucherov
►Second-round pick in 2011 with 499 points in 480 games.
►Detroit had three second-round picks before Kucherov was taken 58th overall: Tomas Jurco (35th), Xavier Ouellet (48th), Ryan Sproul (55th).
2. Center Brayden Point
►Third-round pick in 2014 with 224 points in 260 games.
►Detroit took Portland’s 10-goal scorer Dominic Turgeon (63rd) in the Western Hockey League instead of Moose Jaw’s 36-goal scorer Point (79th).
3. Left winger Ondrej Palat
►Seventh-round pick in 2011 with 306 points in 461 games.
►Detroit’s seventh-round pick (205th) was defenseman Alexey Marchenko, who had 21 career points in 121 career games instead of Palat (208th).
4. Goalie Andrei Vasilevskiy
►First-round pick in 2012 with 138-68-17 record and 2.59 GAA in 233 games.
►Detroit acquired defenseman Kyle Quincey from Tampa Bay in exchange for the 19th pick in the first round used to take the future Vezina Trophy winner.
5. Winger Anthony Cirelli
►Third-round pick in 2015 with 72 points in 133 games.
The Red Wings are going to have a high pick in the 2020 NHL Draft, let’s hope Yzerman makes the right choice.
— Courtesy of Mark Falkner, The Detroit News — LINK
