Bantam draft: Draft-day thread; Tips select center Ryan Chynoweth with their first pick
Published 5:15 pm Thursday, April 29, 2010
Good morning, and welcome to live coverage of today’s WHL bantam draft. The picks are scheduled to begin at 7:30 a.m., if I’m not mistaken, so they should be getting started soon.
First off, there’s several resources for those who are following the draft online themselves. The actual draft can be found on the WHL website. Alan Caldwell will again be providing player information on his blog. Gregg Drinnan is actually in Edmonton and has said he will blog from the draft, though I don’t know whether he’ll be providing live updates. And the Tips website is providing updates about Everett’s picks. I’ll be monitoring these sites throughout the day, so this will be sort of an Everett-based hub for the information available online.
Everett has the 18th pick overall, so it will be a little while before the Tips’ first pick takes place. Also, general manager Doug Soetaert has said he’s willing to trade down if he can fill the gap between the second and fifth rounds, as Everett has no third or fourth rounder. So it’s possible the Tips’ first pick will be even later.
More to follow …
—- UPDATE, 7:42 a.m.
The first pick is in, and as expected the Prince George Cougars selected forward Alex Forsberg from Saskatchewan. Forsberg, who put up big numbers playing up a level in midget this season, was the consensus top player this year, and his older brother Jesse plays for the Cougars.
—- UPDATE, 7:47 a.m.
By the way, Gregg Drinnan is indeed providing live updates. As of now he’s ahead of the WHL website in posting the picks.
—- UPDATE, 8:15 a.m.
OK, Everett’s due up in about five minutes. No indication yet that the Tips have traded their pick.
—- UPDATE, 8:27 a.m.
Well, Everett does, indeed, trade its first-round pick. The Tips deal No. 18 overall to Edmonton in exchange for the Oil King’s second-round pick at No. 24 overall and Edmonton’s fourth rounder at No. 68 overall. So the Tips move down six spots and no longer have an interminable wait between the second and fifth rounds.
—- UPDATE, 8:33 a.m.
So for the first time in franchise history Everett will not pick in the first round of the bantam draft. Soetaert must have had seven names remaining on his list that he was comfortable with. There will be a pause in the draft following the first round, so we’ve got a little longer wait to find out the newest Silvertip.
—- UPDATE, 8:42 a.m.
The first round is over. After the short break Everett will have the second pick of the second round.
He’s what Everett holds after the trade: Nos. 24, 40, 68, 106, 133 and 150. That’s two second rounders, a fourth rounder, a fifth rounder and two seventh rounders, with no picks in the third or eighth rounds. After the eighth round Everett has its own pick in each successive round until the Tips decide they’re done.
—- UPDATE, 9:00 a.m.
Everett’s pick is in, and the Tips select center Ryan Chynoweth from Lethbridge, Alberta.
—- UPDATE, 9:10 a.m.
Here’s more on Chynoweth. He’s listed at 5-foot-11 and 150 pounds, with an April 8 birthdate. Alan Caldwell’s stats list Chynoweth as playing for the Lethbridge Golden Hawks, where in 32 games he had 21 goals, 39 assists and 78 penalty minutes. He’s the grandson of the late Ed Chynoweth, longtime WHL bigwig. Poking around online, it seems Chynoweth generated some differing opinions among scouts.
—- UPDATE, 9:25 a.m.
Everett’s second second-round pick is in and it’s an unusual one. Defenseman Tye Hand is the rare selection from the Northwest Territories. I’m not sure a Northwest Territories native has played in the WHL since Everett joined the league.
—- UPDATE, 9:35 a.m.
More on Hand. He’s listed at 6-foot-1 and 170 pounds. The resident of Yellowknife has a June 14 birthdate. He played in Kelowna this season for the Pursuit of Excellence touring team, where in 42 games he had two goals, 14 assists and 70 penalty minutes. So Everett’s scouting staff didn’t need to trek to the deep north to check out Hand.
—- UPDATE, 10:15 a.m.
Everett’s fourth-round pick, acquired earlier this morning when the Tips traded out of the first round, has been made and it’s defenseman Austin Adam from Surrey, B.C. He’s listed at 6-foot-3 and 160 pounds and has a Mar. 7 birthdate.
—- UPDATE, 11:05 a.m.
In the fifth round Everett selected left wing Geordie Maguire from Winnipeg. Maguire is 5-foot-11, 148 pounds. So that’s two forwards and two defensemen during the first half of the draft for Everett.
The draft takes a lunch break now following the fifth round. Unless something unusual happens I’ll wrap up the rest of the draft with one update.
—- UPDATE, 1:25 p.m.
A quick update. The Tips seem to have picked up the rest of Kootenay’s draft from the eighth round on, or at least that’s the way it’s listed on the WHL website. Gregg Drinnan seems to confirm this as he lists the 169th pick overall, which was Kootenay’s eighth rounder, as Everett’s pick. I have no idea how the Tips picked up the selection(s).
Also, it appears a Snohomish County player was taken in the seventh round. Forward Brad LeLievre, taken by the Seattle Thunderbirds in the seventh round, is listed as being from Mill Creek. If so, I believe that’s the first Snohomish County resident ever taken in the bantam draft.
—- UPDATE, 2:55 p.m.
The Tips are all done, having drafted 12 players — six forwards, four defensemen and two goaltenders. Everett ended up using six picks acquired during the draft — two from trading its first rounder to Edmonton and four late rounders picked up from Kootenay in a yet-to-be-determined manner. Kootenay had a ton of picks in the first four rounds and didn’t need its later picks, so maybe the Ice threw those picks Everett’s way since the Tips drafted Kootenay general manager Jeff Chynoweth’s son (said with tongue in cheek).
Everett’s picks from the second half of the draft are as follows:
Seventh round, 133rd overall: Michael Bell, center, 6-foot-1, 170 pounds, Maple Ridge, B.C.
Seventh round, 150th overall: Austin Lotz, goaltender, 5-foot-11, 180 pounds, St. Aldophe, Manitoba.
Eighth round, 169th overall: Carson Stadnyk, center, 5-foot-11, 140 pounds, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan.
Ninth round, 189th overall: Kyle Messervey, center, 6-foot, 158 pounds, Sundre, Alberta
Ninth round, 193rd overall: Chandler Bruyckere, defenseman, 6-foot-1, 170 pounds, Parksville, B.C.
Tenth round, 209th overall: Cody Depourcq, forward, 5-foot-4, 125 pounds, Penticton, B.C.
Tenth round, 212th overall: Casey Parker, goaltender, 5-foot-8, 120 pounds, Regina, Saskatchewan
Eleventh round, 222th overall: Andrew Weich, defenseman, 6-foot-3, 180 pounds, Calgary, Alberta
Everett picked a lot of players with decent size, so that must have been a priority. Oddly enough, the forwards Everett picked who had the biggest offensive numbers (Stadnyk, Depourcq) were taken later in the draft. That could be because they’re small, the level of competition, NCAA intentions or a combination of those factors.
Player stats can be found at Alan Caldwell’s Small Thoughts at Large and further scouting reports will eventually be available at the Silvertips website.
—- UPDATE, 4:55 p.m.
I’ve talked to Tips general manager Doug Soetaert and director of player development Scott Scoville, and here’s some tidbits about Everett’s picks and the draft in general.
– Everett acquired the back end of Kootenay’s draft in exchange for a seventh-round pick in next year’s draft. The Tips ended up using four of those picks (eighth, ninth, 10th and 11th rounders).
– The Tips made a point of picking up extra picks because they felt this was a deep draft.
– Everett concentrated on selecting players who compete hard. In talking with Soetaert and Scoville it sounded as though they were influenced by the Kelowna team that upset the Tips in the first round of the playoffs. The Rockets made themselves a difficult team to play against because of their grit, and the Tips believe a grittier team will be harder to play against come playoff time. Everett also continued its trend from last year’s bantam draft, taking a bunch of rangy, no-nonsense defensemen.
– Ryan Chynoweth was the player Everett wanted. Soetaert said the Tips would have taken Chynoweth at No. 18, but decided to roll the dice and trade down since there were still four or five players remaining who they liked. It just so happened that the top name on that list was still there six picks later. Chynoweth was described as a high-character two-way player who is determined to win the trophy named for his grandfather, the Ed Chynoweth trophy given to the WHL champions.
– Goaltending was not a priority for Everett in this draft, but seventh rounder Austin Lotz was the second-ranked goalie on the Tips’ list. He was the 21st goalie taken. He’s from rural Manitoba, so he may have flown a little under the radar.
– Eighth rounder Carson Stadnyk and 10th rounder Cody Depourcq are both highly-skilled players with question marks. Stadnyk is a skinny kid who had an up-and-down season as he adjusted to growing three inches, and Depourcq is very small. But at those junctures in the draft the Tips believed it was worth taking a chance on hitting it big.
So that concludes draft day coverage. Thanks for checking in.
