Americans shine at 2006 NHL Draft while snipers change teams
Saturday, 11 August 2007
Originally published in Eishockey News in 2006
By Lucas Aykroyd
Germany outperforms the US in soccer, but the opposite held true at the 2006 NHL Entry Draft in Vancouver, Canada. A record-setting 10 American-born players were taken in the first round, including the #1 overall pick by the St. Louis Blues, defenseman Erik Johnson. Eleven Canadians and nine Europeans rounded out the top 30 picks.
Three Germans were drafted: defenseman Korbinian Holzer of Bad Tölz EC (111th overall) by Toronto, center Felix Schutz of the St. John Fog Devils (117th) by Buffalo, and winger Constantin Braun of Eisbären Juniors Berlin (164th) by Los Angeles.
The 2006 talent crop was relatively weak, but the Blues hope their 193-cm, 100-kg top choice can emulate Chris Pronger and Al MacInnis.
“I talked to Sidney Crosby and he said [making the NHL] was a tough jump for him mentally and physically,” said Johnson, a product of the US National Under-18 Team. “But I think I have the mental and physical strength to do it.”
Center Jordan Staal, the #2 pick, was excited to join Crosby with Pittsburgh: “I see a young team that’s got the potential to be a great team.” GM Ray Shero cautioned against comparing the 17-year-old to his brother Eric, who led the NHL playoffs with 28 points: “The bloodlines are great, but I’m drafting Jordan Staal based on what I saw from Jordan Staal.”
Canadian World Junior and US college star Jonathan Toews went third to Chicago, while Washington chose Sweden’s Nicklas Backstrom fourth as a potential future center for Alexander Ovechkin.
Once a consensus #1 overall pick, Phil Kessel went fifth to Boston, but the speedy University of Minnesota winger was all smiles: “Hopefully I’ll show [other teams] that maybe I should have been drafted higher.
Vancouver surprised many by making WHL forward Michael Grabner the second highest-drafted Austrian ever after Thomas Vanek at #14 overall.
There were fewer trades than expected. The biggest blockbuster took place the day before the draft. On June 23, Canucks GM Dave Nonis acquired franchise goalie Roberto Luongo and defenseman Lukas Krajicek plus a sixth-round pick from Florida for troubled power forward Todd Bertuzzi, goalie Alex Auld, and defenseman Bryan Allen.
On draft day, two notable snipers got moved. Minnesota acquired Pavol Demitra from Los Angeles for Patrick O’Sullivan and a first-round pick, and Colorado swapped Alex Tanguay for Calgary’s Jordan Leopold and two second-round picks.
Meanwhile, Dallas got Patrik Stefan and Jaroslav Modry from Atlanta for Niko Kapanen and a seventh-rounder, and Toronto sent Finnish goalie prospect Tuukka Rask to Boston for 2004 Calder Trophy winner Andrew Raycroft.
There was optimism about the top two German picks.
“Korzinian Holzer is a good-sized kid who skates and moves the puck well and has good hockey sense,” said Toronto director of amateur scouting Dave Morrison. “He’s an 18-year-old who’ll fill out.”
“Felix Schutz tied Marco Sturm in scoring at the B Pool World Championship,” said Buffalo GM Darcy Regier. “He loves playing hockey and he’s got a good skill set.”
Germany’s best NHL draft year was 2001, when Marcel Goc, Christian Ehrhoff, Christoph Schubert, and Denis Seidenberg were among the seven DEL players chosen.
HockeyAdventure.com brings you the best of Lucas Aykroyd's current blog entries and archived articles. Based in Vancouver, Aykroyd has written about NHL, international, and junior hockey for The Hockey News, The Sporting News, the NHL Yearbook, Rinkside, NHL.com, Eishockey News, and Prospects Hockey. As an editor and journalist, he has covered three Olympics, ten World Championships, three World Junior Championships, one World Women's Championship, and one World U18 Championship for IIHF.com and HockeyCanada.ca. He was one of 56 experts chosen to vote for the IIHF's Centennial All-Star Team.
No. 1 — May 24th, 2011 at 5:49 pm
http://www.dress-herveleger.org
No. 2 — May 29th, 2011 at 7:54 pm
This is a cool episode, it also discussed on how to enable auditing in Sharepoint and some tips on creating an end user training plan. Thanks for sharing this! I must recommend this to my officemates.
No. 3 — May 29th, 2011 at 11:52 pm
It seem to be a group of very thoughtful young bloggers.
No. 4 — May 31st, 2011 at 11:38 pm
20Great article about this topic, I have been lately in your blog once or twice now. I just wanted to say hi and show my thanks for the information provided.
No. 5 — June 1st, 2011 at 1:30 am
h:No matter what part of the country you live in, or what time of the year it is, everyone needs an shoes that is functional yet stylish
http://www.nikeshoesbuyonline.com
No. 6 — June 1st, 2011 at 6:23 am
13Your place is valueble for me. Thanks!…
No. 7 — June 4th, 2011 at 1:58 am
14Great article about this topic, I have been lately in your blog once or twice now. I just wanted to say hi and show my thanks for the information provided.
No. 8 — June 4th, 2011 at 2:16 am
We keep talking about spring trends in handbags, clearly there are many. We have brought you stories on http://www.coachests.com/ coach outlet online
No. 9 — June 4th, 2011 at 2:49 am
I really enjoyed reading this post, thanks for sharing. The http://www.jeantrs.com/ True Religion Outlet are nice!
No. 10 — June 10th, 2011 at 3:57 am
good
No. 11 — June 14th, 2011 at 10:39 pm
I love your blog so much, and there are just some differences with others’. Hope there will be more wonderful things in your blog. Happy every day!
No. 12 — June 14th, 2011 at 10:50 pm
It is my great pleasure to visit your website and to enjoy your excellent post here. I like that very much. I can feel that you paid much attention for those articles, as all of them make sense and are very useful. Thanks so much for sharing. I can be very good reader&listener if you are same searching for all to be good. Appreciate for your time! Happy everyday!
No. 13 — June 14th, 2011 at 10:56 pm
Nice site! I adore a few of the articles that have been written, and particularly the comments posted! I will definately be returning!
No. 14 — June 19th, 2011 at 7:30 pm
Air Jordan of our outlet store are offered at fire sale prices,including Jordan Shoes which is sale very well.I suggest that you should take this chance and action now to buy our Cheap Air Jordan on sale,it will be a very good choose for you.
http://www.jordanshoes113.com
No. 15 — June 19th, 2011 at 8:31 pm
Thank you for your share, i love it very much.
No. 16 — June 24th, 2011 at 12:09 am
I love this dsi article since it is one of those which truly convey useful ideas.Tommy Mens Polos
No. 17 — June 25th, 2011 at 2:27 am
Thanks for sharing!
This is really a very cool blog, thanks a great deal for this! I’ve read a great deal about this topic in the past and I agree with you.ate
No. 18 — June 27th, 2011 at 11:24 pm
In this article I found very different things which are Very characteristic. I have never seen before.Thank you very much for sharing. you are very creative.pandora charms
No. 19 — June 29th, 2011 at 2:34 am
http://www.thomas-sabo-uk.org/Thomas-Sabo-Bottle-Of-Champagne.html I believe everybody went like Ones New website, reason being things like this site without doubt has a article on quality. I loved read A New content. go on To remain a useful article, I will avail Once more by One additional time. Bless you
No. 20 — June 30th, 2011 at 6:07 am
you experience the selection of baffling your role player describe and amount on duty them
No. 21 — July 3rd, 2011 at 5:10 pm
rItyugonynelblk kohls printable coupons bybdhoahwsyz
No. 22 — July 4th, 2011 at 9:53 pm
This is a great blog,I like this post it is very good and informative.I am sure that this post will be very much helpful for people.
No. 23 — July 5th, 2011 at 1:14 am
In order to repay customers, sometimes we provide special discount Louis vuitton bags http://www.niketrainers4uk.co.uk in our Louis vuitton store, and we have many new style Louis vuitton for sale now, Donâ??t hesitate
No. 24 — July 9th, 2011 at 1:09 pm
Incredibly nice post. I just stumbled upon your weblog and wanted to say that I’ve genuinely enjoyed surfing around your blog posts. Following all I is going to be subscribing to your rss feed and I hope you write again soon!