Welcome to June. With that, welcome to NHL Draft Combine week in Buffalo.
A total of 90 draft-eligible prospects will spend the week at Harborcenter being interviewed by teams and participating in several fitness tests. This will be their chance to make a lasting impression on a team when they have to decide who to pick.
Most NHL Combines have the same kind of storylines year in and year out. This year is different though. The sport has undergone significant changes even since last year’s Combine.
Here are four storylines that we will be watching closely this week in Buffalo. Our team with the Hockey Writers will be on site starting Friday afternoon and then all-day Saturday for the majority of the fitness testing.
Fans love rumors. There’s no denying it. It gets everyone talking about possibilities. It generates interest. Teams on the other hand cannot stand rumors. They want to keep things as quiet as possible.
This week in Buffalo however, teams are going to have to prepare for the possibility of even more rumors than normal. Why? That’s because the NHL Combine will act as the last major event in which everyone will be together.
Recall that the NHL Draft is going to a de-centralized format in Los Angeles. Teams will act in their local markets in more of a war room type situation. There will be talking but not in person.
At this NHL Combine, there will be a lot of talking in person. With more talking comes more rumors. This is where we all have to be especially careful about the rumors that come out. Some of it might be real. Others are completed fabricated.
The Combine is where a lot of business leading into the NHL Draft starts to come into focus. The big story here is twofold. First, the amount of potential news that will drop seems it could be higher than usual. But then second, we have to separate fact from fiction.
When we recap the event, we’ll share our observations. But we must have an extra level of care when it comes to rumors that might come.
Don’t believe everything you hear. As always, time will reveal the truth in all matters under consideration.
The Combine will be our first chance to talk to the top prospects about the changes to the CHL and NCAA. The players now have more choices than ever.
For us, the big story here is how prospects came to their decisions. Everyone has the right to choose their own path. What will be interesting to hear is what led them to decide one way or another.
This new dynamic is still developing in a lot of ways. While we think we have an idea of what everything will look like, some things still have to reveal themselves. Specifically, what rule changes will there be for players that leave the CHL and go to the NCAA’s?
It will be curious to hear what the prospects have to say and if they have any understanding of what could be coming from a rules perspective. We also could learn of more commitments throughout the course of the week.
We think some of the stories of how a prospect decided on their next team will be very interesting. We’ll also learn what they valued in making their decision (shorter season in NCAA, more pro-like in CHL to name a couple.)
This is one constant of the NHL Combine. We go in trying to figure out how the top of the draft will work out. This year, it is more unpredictable than in recent years.
That’s because there isn’t as clear cut of a number-one as there has been in the past. While there are many who believe the New York Islanders will draft defenseman Matthew Schaefer first overall, it’s not guaranteed.
What if new GM Mathieu Darche and the Islanders value one of the forwards more? James Hagens, Michael Misa and Anton Frondell are all top-flight centers that could become a massive part of what happens on Long Island for many years to come.
Even if Schaefer is the choice at one, there is a wide-open debate on who will be second. We don’t even know if the San Jose Sharks will pick second.
That leads us into our fourth storyline of the Combine.
It is almost unheard of for an NHL team to seriously think about trading off their pick when it’s in the top-five. The 2025 NHL Draft just might finally be the year in which we see some significant action at the top.
What if the Islanders want one of the forwards? What if the Sharks want Schaefer? These teams could swap picks with the Islanders getting some extra draft capital to help with their future.
This is the one time where trading the first pick could make some sense. We’re not saying the Islanders would actually do it. But without a consensus Connor McDavid like player available at the top, there is an argument to be made that it’s best for business for the Islanders to ponder a big move like that.
Then as you go further down the draft list, teams have already said they’d be willing to move off their first rounder in the right deal. What will Utah do now that they move up 10 spots? Are they committed to making a pick fourth overall? Or could that be had for the right price?
Prospects are routinely asked how many teams they spoke to this week as well as who they spoke to. Occasionally, their answers could give subtle hints about what a team might be thinking. For example, the fact that multiple teams in the top-5 last year took Beckett Sennecke to dinner strongly suggested it was possible he’d go in the top-5. That’s exactly what happened.
The ingredients are there that could make this draft an explosive one. We’ll start putting the puzzle together this week in Buffalo to see if that comes to pass.
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