The NHL Draft is scheduled for tomorrow afternoon, and with all of the rounds scheduled for that day, there will be much in the way of moves being made, as this year's draft is deep. The teams to watch include the Calgary Flames and Columbus Blue Jackets, both of whom have three picks in the first round, as well as the Boston Bruins, who would like to move back into the first round after losing their pick to Dallas by virtue of making the Stanley Cup Finals as part of the condition for acquiring Jaromir Jagr. Pittsburgh does not make their first pick until number 77, which means the third round, and given that they were exposed by a tougher Boston team despite having the superior talent (the Canucks know that all too well), the Pens will need to either make do with what they do have or try to trade back into the top 45, which will be hard to so, since they don't have a lot other than defensemen. The Pens need goaltending, and there is no guarantee that Eric Comrie will be around by the time they make their first pick (Zachary Fucale is a certainty to be off the board by the end of the first round), and goaltending isn't particularly a strong suit in this year's draft.
As for what else could happen, the Ottawa Senators are rumored to be moving up and the Edmonton Oilers are rumored to be wanting to move down. I don't get into rumors, but if there's a player that the Senators covet (perhaps Elias Lindholm or Darnell Nurse, depending on who's available), the Sens do have considerable talent in the pipeline to move (I'm looking at either Mark Stone, Matt Puempel, or Stefan Noesen) and the Sens are better than people think, particularly in goal.
The NHL Draft this year is definitely going to be a wild ride, and with considerable talent coming in this year, next year, and in 2015 (Connor McDavid of the Erie Otters is a kid to watch), the NHL should be in good hands for the next few years in terms of overall talent.
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