Sens draft picks: ‘I think it’s a smorgasbord of players’
The Ottawa Senators have set up their headquarters at a downtown hotel, and in case anybody needs a reminder they ’re still preparing for two picks in the first round of Friday’s NHL Draft.
Of course, it would be easy to get sidetracked with the flurry of action around here lately. Winger Mike Hoffman was dealt to the San Jose Sharks Tuesday morning before being shipped to the Florida Panthers in a separate deal and now there’s no shortage of talk surrounding the future of captain Erik Karlsson.
When he’s not fielding phone calls, general manager Pierre Dorion will be working closely with the chief scout Trent Mann and the staff to get ready to make the No. 4 selection in the draft. The club also has the No. 22 pick acquired in the trade that sent Derick Brassard to the Pittsburgh Penguins in February.
The prospects for success next season don’t look good but the Senators should be able to score a good prospect at No. 4. Swedish sensation Rasmus Dahlin will go No. 1 to the Buffalo Sabres and Andrei Svechnikov of Barrie is likely headed to the Carolina Hurricanes next. That will leave the Senators with no shortage of players to choose from depending on what the Montreal Canadiens do at No. 3. Wingers Filip Zadina of the Halifax Mooseheads and Brady Tkachuk of Boston University are among the candidates along with blueliners that include Sweden’s Adam Boqvist.
“I don’t think they can make a mistake at No. 4 at all,” said Craig Button, TSN’s director of scouting. “I think it’s a smorgasbord of players. After Dahlin and Svechnikov, the next eight players, I don’t think there’s anything separating them.
“For any team, after the top two, if you want a defenceman you’ve got a choice of defencemen. They’re different types of defencemen but they’re defencemen. You want a centreman, there’s centreman there. You want wingers? Tkachuk is good and Zadina is good. They’re different types of wingers.
“When I look at the next group of eight players, I don’t see anything that would say, ‘Oh boy, that would be a real step up to take that player.’ I think they’re all really close. They’re all players that are going to be productive NHL players and very good players.”
Button said the best bet for every NHL team is not to overthink these players.
“Too much brain power is spent trying to figure out which guy is going to be better. ‘This guy is going to be better than that guy and this guy is going to be better than that guy,’ ” Button said. “It’s too close to call right now.
“Figure out what you want, figure out what you like and then take it.”
In his mock draft for TSN Tuesday night, Button had the Senators taking Zadina and he’s a pure goal scorer that could help immediately if Ottawa decides to go young.
“(Zadina), Svechnikov and Dahlin, I don’t have any question they can play in the NHL next year,” Button said. “So, does that become a factor in terms of long-range planning?
“I don’t think you should take a player just because he can play in the NHL, but when you look at his abilities, he’s a scorer, he can make plays and he’s hungry and determined. You look at that and you think he can play next year so that becomes a very attractive player.
“Even though I sit here and say I don’t know whether Tkachuk or Zadina is better, I can say with a lot of conviction that I think Zadina can play next year and I don’t think Tkachuk can. Now, I say, I’m not sure who the better player is, but if you get a player in your lineup a year earlier I don’t see any downside to that.”
Button said Tkachuk is an excellent prospect and it’s nice that his father Keith played in the league and his brother Matthew plays for the Flames but that shouldn’t be a deciding factor.
“I love Brady Tkachuk for what he does on the ice,” Button added. “The fact is he competes, he’s got really good skill and he’s got all those intangibles. To me, it’s about the player and he can play.”
The Senators have seven or eight candidates at the No. 4 spot, including defencemen Quinn Hughes (Michigan), Evan Bouchard (London), Noah Dobson (Acadie-Bathurst) and Boqvist (Brynas, Sweden).
“These are all good players and I think they’re all going to be productive NHL players,” Button said. “I don’t see players outside of the group of eight that maybe fits in there. I think those are the guys and that’s why I call it a smorgasbord because you might take a bite at one end of the smorgasbord more than you do at (the other) end.
“It bodes really well (for Ottawa). You just have to understand that this is the type of player this guy is and this is what you want and this is why you think he fits. If you think Zadina is closer to playing and that’s a tiebreaker, take him. If you want a right shot defenceman and you think Bouchard is a little smoother than Dobson, take him. You’ve got a group of players you can’t go wrong on; figure out what you want and get it and celebrate it. That’s the spot you want to be in.”