I said this earlier about the three recent high draftees - Cuelemans, Svozil and Knazko - that we really only need one of them to become a full-time NHL defender. More than that isn't a problem, or it's the good kind of have, but I've been thinking the same with the glut of defenders in 15-20+. I'm certainly not rooting against any of them succeeding, but it's not organizationally necessary for them all to do so.
Right. At the moment it looks like we project to have 3 top 4 D-men in the coming years - Werenski, Gavrikov, and Boqvist. All we need is one more. And it doesn't even have to come from those three kids you mentioned. Here's some possibilities:
1) One of Ceulemans, Svozil, or Knazko. (Our top 3 D prospects who haven't played in the NHL yet).
2) Andrew Peeke. Still very young.
3) Jake Bean. Same thing.
4) A guy we draft in the next couple years. A guy like Jiricek would be a safe bet for top 4 RD.
5) Trade. Ideally we won't have to go that route but many of us have commented about the expected logjam up front, so we'll have something to offer.
6) UFA. There's no shortage of cap space in the short or medium term. Maybe we'll grab the next Adam Larsson type.