With barely a month to go before the 2024 NHL Entry Draft in Las Vegas, discussions about what teams will do on June 28 and 29 is heating up. We’ve already penned a Round 1 draft analysis, which tends to be the most exciting round insofar as it usually reveals what each club believes its most pressing need is. But plenty of solid and sometimes great players get selected in subsequent rounds. Those chosen between the 33rd and 64th spots don’t get the glitz and glamor of those chosen in the top 32, but they’re no slouches either.
Today we explores what the Seattle Kraken’s needs and options will be come the sophomore phase of the draft.
Seattle’s Enviable Position
After potentially choosing Konsta Helenius, Trevor Connelly, Cole Eiserman, or Tij Iginla in the opening round (as per our prediction a few weeks ago), the Kraken have the benefit of making two choices in Round 2. This is because they dealt Alex Wennberg to the New York Rangers in March exchange for two draft picks, including New York’s second round option this summer. Since the Rangers won the Presidents’ Trophy and made it to the Eastern Conference Final, it looks as if that bonus pick will be no better than 60 but still, it’s a very nice problem to have.
The main spot for the Kraken in Round 2 is number 40. Like with our first-round analysis, we’ll shower our crack prospects and draft writing team with praise for supplying us with bountiful content to understand who should available at around the 40 and 65 spots. Another element at play when franchises get this deep into the draft is to figure out where they need more depth. Who might be available at one or multiple positions that, in a season or two, could be an NHL-ready replacement for someone who may not be on the roster anymore?
Related: 2024 NHL Draft Rankings – Forbes’s Top 100 for May
It makes for a tricky analysis, say nothing of the fact that, at the time of writing, there is no way of officially knowing what’s in store for unrestricted and restricted free agents Matty Beniers, Eeli Tolvanen, Kailer Yamamoto, Pierre-Edouard Bellemare, Tomas Tatar, and Justin Schultz. A couple of those names might be shoo-ins to re-sign, but we don’t know that. To that point, the only way of gathering more information as to what’s in store for some of those roster members is what the Kraken might do on June 28 and 29!
What the Kraken Need
For this discussion, we’ll consider the needs based on players who feature on this ESPN Kraken stats list and this CapFriendly player list. The latter features all the players with NHL contracts and the former everyone who suited up for Seattle at least once during the 2023-24 season. If Coachella Valley Firebirds and Kansas City Mavericks regulars are taken into consideration, we’ll be here all day, second and third guessing our predictions.
Seattle could use more depth at centre, on the left wing, and on the left side of the defense. They have plenty of guys who can play a mixture of positions, and that’s excellent to have, but they could use another pure centre and a pure left defender. Jaden Schwartz is the club’s only pure left winger. Brian Dumoulin is their only pure left defender.
Funnily enough, LWs and Cs are predicted to be popular choices in the 39-42 range. American Cole Hutson (LD), Dean Letourneau (C), and Alexander Zetterberg (C) are all predicted to be selected in that range. There is also Matvei Shuravin who our teams says will go 37th, but one never really knows.
If the surname Hutson rings a bell, that’s because Cole is the brother of Lane Hutson, who made a splash with the Montreal Canadiens during the final week of the regular season. Although he plays defense, the word on the street is that he is a terrific two-player player, netting 51 points in 51 games with the United Stats National Team Development Program U18 club. He also left a mark on Team USA at the 2024 U18 World Championship. Seattle is a sound defensive club, but drafting a defender who can help out in significant ways on the attack, àla Erik Karlsson, would be fantastic.
Swede Zetterberg is said to be very fast and skillful but lacks body strength and only measures 5-foot-8. Letourneau is a beast of a human being at 6-foot-6, has agility, and a rocket of a shot to boot.
Shuravin is a Russian youth who has developed in the Kontinental Hockey League (KHL) and in the Junior Hockey League (or Minor Hockey League, hence MHL). He’s said to be a mobile defenseman who can carry the puck out of the zone with relative ease but doesn’t contribute on the attack with many points.
Of these four choices (and none may be available, honestly) Zetterberg seems like the biggest risk. NHL players and teams are getting bigger and bigger, so drafting a small player could backfire. The standout here is Hutson. Is he skates anything like his brother in Montreal, it would make for an incredible pick.
What About That Other Round 2 Pick?
Now we get into the weeds of the draft. As per our writers, there might not be many offensive weapons available late in the second round. Of the last 10 spots, there could be as few as three attackers.
They are Swedes Simon Zether (F), Melvin Fernström (F), and Russian Yegor Surin (C). Of those three, Surin seems like he would make for an exciting fit. As per certain evaluations, he’s not just an offensive force to be reckoned, he is a force in general; perhaps not as audaciously brilliant as Alexander Ovechkin was when he bursted onto the scene, but it would seem as though when Surin is not tallying points, his tallying hits.
The Kraken don’t bring much of a fear factor when they come to the arena. The age of hockey goons is long past but clubs still need one or two guys on the roster who rivals know should not be messed with. Furthermore, if rivals mess with the less-pugilistic players, teammates like Surin will stand up for them.
Plans will probably become clearer in Seattle’s offices once Dan Bylsma’s ride with the Firebirds is over. They are currently battling in the Calder Cup Western Conference Final. Once their playoff journey is done, Bylsma will firmly step into the Kraken head coaching job vacated after Dave Hakstol was fired. That said, speculating about what the club might do at the draft is still tons of fun and allows writers and readers to image what their favoured clubs might look like years down the road.
