WHL Draft live- (now)

[S E P H]

Holy crap I played with Dominic Turgeon brother. Good seeing him get draft. Has great speed and vision.

Yes he's Pierre Turgeon's son.

 

[hockeywhiz]

Jayce Hawryluk was supposed to be #1 but he's bombed. Picked in 2nd round.

 

[CandiedBacon]

Anyone know what happened to Tyler Sandhu. He's a good friend of my sister he fell from Top 5 to pick 42

 

[hockeywhiz]

When a player is on a strong team like Burnaby Winter club, it is difficult to judge how good he is. He is playing with talented hockey players while most teams do not have rich crops. Scouts do know their stuff.

 

[hockeywhiz]

Here: http://www.whl.ca/draft/fullDraft

five rounds are completed now.

 

[leoleo3535]

Keep in mind that in many cases players that "fell" only did so because of threat of or risk of NCAA routes.

 

[hockeywhiz]

Correct, That's another valid reason.

 

[YEGJuniorFan]

anyone have any info on the Oil Kings pick Aaron Irving?

 

[JumpierPegasus]

Awesome. Jake is both in my school and in a couple of my classes. Nice to see him go 1st overall.

 

[ThankYouBasedGod]

Son, or nephew, I can't remember atm

Rich Pilon's kid?

His cousin.

 

[ThankYouBasedGod]

This looks like a weaker draft... but then again I live in Chicago and I have no idea what I'm talking about.

Its a very strong and deep draft year

I have heard from several people that this is a weak draft year. It was also mentioned in the paper.

 

[KingJet*]

Jake Virtanen, hes looks good on ice

 

[pdxshark]

Anyone know what happened to Tyler Sandhu. He's a good friend of my sister he fell from Top 5 to pick 42

he got lucky. Top 5 you go to a rebuilding team. Now he's drafted by a team in the league finals

 

[Vikke]

Jake Virtanen, hes looks good on ice

fixed it.

 

[ecemleafs]

1st American i noticed was 64th overall. weak year for americans or do teams not take them high out of fear they will go the college route?

 

[William H Bonney]

1st American i noticed was 64th overall. weak year for americans or do teams not take them high out of fear they will go the college route?

Americans don't typically go very high in the WHL draft. They're drafted as 14/15 year olds (compared to 15/16 for the OHL) so it's really difficult for those teams to get strong reads on if the kids will seriously consider the WHL route. You won't find very many Americans that will/want to commit to the WHL at that age. You also have to consider the states in the WHL territory as well:

Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Idaho, Kansas, Minnesota, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Mexico, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Oregon, South Dakota, Texas, Utah, Washington and Wyoming.

A lot of non-traditional states in there and Minnesota kids rarely will go to the WHL as well. Makes it tough.

 

[leoleo3535]

1st American i noticed was 64th overall. weak year for americans or do teams not take them high out of fear they will go the college route?

....and some of the "Americans" are Canadians....just living in the US on a temporary basis....born and raised in Canada but the draft shows their current place of residence.

 

[MPStoEberletoHall*]

Jayce Hawryluk was supposed to be #1 but he's bombed. Picked in 2nd round.

I doubt it. I dont even think he should have went in the 2nd

 

[Tigers1992]

My congratulations go out to the WHL Scouts. Its hard enough to project players at 15/16. WHL does it at 14/15, well done.

 

[KingLB]

Americans don't typically go very high in the WHL draft. They're drafted as 14/15 year olds (compared to 15/16 for the OHL) so it's really difficult for those teams to get strong reads on if the kids will seriously consider the WHL route. You won't find very many Americans that will/want to commit to the WHL at that age. You also have to consider the states in the WHL territory as well:



A lot of non-traditional states in there and Minnesota kids rarely will go to the WHL as well. Makes it tough.

This, plus many Americans can play the NCAA "card" to go somewhere they want....and if its only one team why would they use a high pick, when they can get this quality player later in the draft.

Think this may have been the reason so many kids from the LA Selects 95's dropped even though almost the whole team probably coulda been drafted.

All that said, it's defiantly a lot lesser year then last year for CA.

 

[Alberta tough]

This, plus many Americans can play the NCAA "card" to go somewhere they want....and if its only one team why would they use a high pick, when they can get this quality player later in the draft.

Think this may have been the reason so many kids from the LA Selects 95's dropped even though almost the whole team probably coulda been drafted.

All that said, it's defiantly a lot lesser year then last year for CA.

More and more you are seeing Western Canadian players doing this as well. This year is a weaker draft allaround.

 

[Andy Dufresne]

You also have to consider the states in the WHL territory as well:



A lot of non-traditional states in there and Minnesota kids rarely will go to the WHL as well. Makes it tough.

A kid from Nebraska got drafted this year, don't know if that's ever happened before.

 

[R S]

Looks like it was a solid draft this time around. Listening to Blades Assistant GM Jarrod Brodsky, this draft didn't quite have the high end talent of some years, but the depth was as good as any in recent memory. Very solid players well in the middle to late rounds.

Here's my Blades draft recap:

http://whl-from-above.blogspot.com/2011/05/saskatoon-blades-bantam-draft-recap.html

 

[Johny Drama]

My congratulations go out to the WHL Scouts. Its hard enough to project players at 15/16. WHL does it at 14/15, well done.

You are correct, but its a slightly different criteria. NHL is looking ahead 4-5 years at least and is really basing it on future potential. Junior leagues are more concerned with the next 2-3 years. Also, junior teams may actually shy away from a player if he is too good. In otherwords, they might feel a kid will jump to the NHL soon as he is drafted, so the kid who is good but stays for 4 years of junior is actually more valuable.

 

[Andy Dufresne]

You are correct, but its a slightly different criteria. NHL is looking ahead 4-5 years at least and is really basing it on future potential. Junior leagues are more concerned with the next 2-3 years. Also, junior teams may actually shy away from a player if he is too good. In otherwords, they might feel a kid will jump to the NHL soon as he is drafted, so the kid who is good but stays for 4 years of junior is actually more valuable.

I've never heard of a team in the WHL shying away from a kid because he's too good, every consensus #1 pick gets drafted #1 unless there's fear of him going NCAA (even then Toews went #1, Moffat #2).

As far as the time frame, the kids drafted this year won't be eligible to play in the AHL for another 5 years. There really hasn't been that many WHL kids to play NHL hockey as teenagers, even then it's nearly impossible to guess who they'll be at 14/15 years old.

Fears that they'd be in the NHL early is not the reason Schenn or Myers weren't drafted higher, they simply weren't rated that high at the time of their WHL draft year, and even so Kelowna would do it all over again. Kids that are NHL good at 18/19, are kids you win with when they're 17/18.
Just my opinion...