CHICAGO – The New Jersey Devils ended a mystery Friday night as the NHL draft finally took centre stage.
The Devils took Nico Hischier with the first pick No. 1 overall pick in team history, opting for the so-called “Swiss McDavid” over Nolan Patrick, the big Brandon Wheat Kings centre. It wasn’t clear which way the Devils would go in a draft that lacked the slam-dunk stars of recent years.
Patrick was long expected to be the first pick but he ended up going second to the Philadelphia Flyers and will presumably line up as a powerful second centre behind captain Claude Giroux.
The absence of an Auston Matthews or Connor McDavid helped keep the draft in the background all week as trades and the first expansion draft in 17 years soaked up much of the recent NHL spotlight.
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Hischier, an electric centre with game-breaking speed, rose into top spot with an emphatic first season in the Quebec Major Junior League, piling up 38 goals and 86 points in 57 games as a rookie for the Halifax Mooseheads. The 18-year-old made an especially notable impression at the world junior championships this past winter with four goals and seven points in five games for Switzerland.
Hischier is now the highest-drafted Swiss player in NHL history, surpassing Nino Niederreiter, who went fifth overall to the Islanders in 2010. He’ll certainly provide a jump-start to the Devils offence, which sputtered to 28th overall last season.
Patrick, a Winnipeg native, was superb two seasons ago with 41 goals and 102 points in 72 games for Brandon before adding the Western Hockey League’s playoff MVP. Injuries marred this past season though for the 18-year-old, who suited up in only 33 games following off-season sports hernia surgery.
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He still finished 10th in the WHL with 1.39 points per-game and was dubbed the Canadian Hockey League’s top NHL draft prospect.
His father, Steve, and uncle, James, both played in the NHL – the latter for almost 1,300 games with the New York Rangers.
While there was a long-simmering debate over which player would ultimately go first overall, this year’s draft was overshadowed – even by the host city. A day after the Chicago Bulls dealt franchise cornerstone Jimmy Butler to Minnesota, the Blackhawks parted with 2016 Calder trophy winner Artemi Panarin in a swap that returned two-time Stanley Cup winner Brandon Saad.
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Other Friday flurries saw Derek Stepan and Antti Raanta sent to Arizona for the seventh overall pick. Jordan Eberle was dealt from Edmonton a day earlier.
Earlier this week, the NHL was consumed by the first expansion draft since 2000 with the Las Vegas Golden Knights not only selecting 30 players but scooping up a haul of future draft picks – including five this weekend.
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