Dallas Stars Cannot Afford Another First Round Bust In NHL Draft

The first round of the NHL Entry Draft has not been the friendliest to the Dallas Stars in the past few years. This year, they cannot bear to use their first-rounder on another disappointing pick.

A top-three pick is a beautiful thing in any professional sports draft.

Any NHL team that receives one automatically has a ticket to an NHL-ready player who is ready to hit the ice as early as the following season.

But it does come with a price. The fact of the matter is that a top-three pick almost assures that the team is currently on an unsuccessful run. They likely are coming off the heels of an awful season and need something to spark a turnaround.

That’s where the draft pick comes in great handy. And fortunately for the Dallas Stars, they are already past the dreary part of this scenario and are simply waiting to cash in on their pick. But this year in particular is special for the Stars.

Dallas Stars /

Dallas Stars

Dallas was awarded the third overall pick in the 2017 NHL Entry Draft after being one of the three teams picked in the Draft Lottery. Even though they finished 24th in the NHL, they were lucky enough to snag a top-three selection, guaranteeing them one of the best players in the draft.

Though this year’s draft class does not feature the same caliber of players that have been taken in the top three over the past few drafts, they are still regarded as the best young talents around.

This will be the first time in Dallas Stars history that the franchise will pick in the top three in an entry draft, which just goes to show that it is a rare feat for a team like the Stars to achieve. Dallas more often than not finishes in the top 20 of the league and never really has a shot at a top three pick. Now they do, and that makes it even more crucial that they spend it wisely.

For the past decade or so, the Stars have seen some hard times with their first-round picks. With most franchises, their first-round picks over the past decade are now at the NHL level and thriving beautifully.

For Dallas, they haven’t quite met that standard with their picks.

Let’s take a quick look back at the Stars’ first round picks over the past decade:

2016: F Riley Tufte, 25th overall

2015: F Denis Gurianov, 12th overall

2014: D Julius Honka, 14th overall

2013: F Valeri Nichushkin,10th overall AND F Jason Dickinson, 29th overall

2012: F Radek Faksa, 13th overall

2011: D Jamie Oleksiak, 14th overall

2010: G Jack Campbell, 11th overall

2009: F Scott Glennie, 8th overall

2006: D Ivan Vishnevskiy, 27th overall

Out of those 10 players, only seven are still in the Stars’ system. Vishnevskiy was traded to the Atlanta Thrashers in exchange for G Kari Lehtonen and never truly amounted to much.

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Glennie stayed in the Dallas Stars’ system until 2015 when Dallas finally decided to part ways with the forward. He played one game at the NHL level in his career with the Stars and is now playing for the Manitoba Moose in the AHL. As a friendly reminder, the Stars could have taken Ryan Ellis, Dmitry Kulikov, Nick Leddy, or Chris Kreider with the eighth pick instead of Glennie.

Campbell never got off the ground with the Stars. After several seasons with the Texas Stars that were plagued with inconsistency and injury, the Stars traded him to Los Angeles for D Nick Ebert. Once again, the Stars could have picked Cam Fowler, Vladimir Tarasenko, Jaden Schwartz, or Evgeny Kuznetsov with the eleventh pick.

Jamie Oleksiak has yet to hit his full potential and has been nothing more than a “seventh man” for the Dallas Stars over the past two years. Nichushkin left Dallas for the KHL at the beginning of this past season and signed a two-year deal.

On the bright side, Radek Faksa, Jason Dickinson, Julius Honka, and Denis Gurianov are quickly working their way to NHL status and look as though they are in for a bright future. Tufte is playing college hockey at Minnesota-Duluth and had an impressive freshman campaign.

Though the recent past has seen improvements under GM Jim Nill (Nichushkin, Dickinson, Honka, Gurianov, and Tufte), it hasn’t been the best decade overall for Dallas Stars’ first round picks. That makes this year’s draft even more important.

Next: Stars Can Learn From Hurricanes In Hunt For New Goalie

If the Stars are truly going to use their third overall pick in the draft (and not trade it away for a new goalie/defender), then they will need to spend it wisely. That involves finding the best possible player for their system.

Here’s to hoping that they get it done.

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