Welcome to the Sound Of Hockey NHL Draft Live Blog. Assuming no trades, the Kraken will have eight draft picks today. We will continue to add information about their selections here throughout the day. The most recent updates will appear at the top, so scroll down to see earlier news. If you want to catch up on the Kraken’s first-round selection of Berkly Catton, check out Curtis Isacke’s breakdown here or Cameron Rigger’s profile on Catton from back in February.
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12:39 PM
That wraps up the 2024 NHL Draft. The Kraken ended up with eight picks in total. As a reminder, most of the players will be in Seattle this week as part of the Seattle Kraken Development Camp. Keep an eye on SoundOfHockey.com for deeper draft analysis and dev camp coverage.
Additionally, free agency opens Monday morning, and we anticipate some aggressive moves by the Kraken. We will cover it all right here.
12:22 PM
It appears the Seattle Kraken are done of the day. Here is how their picks shook out at the 2024 NHL Draft.
Here’s how Round 7 played out.
12:12 PM
Assuming no more trades, the Seattle Kraken use their last pick on defenseman Jakub Fibigr from the Mississauga Steelheads in the OHL. Fibigr is from Czechia but played his draft year in North America. Let’s let him give you his own scouting report and a bit more info on his background.
12:05 PM
Home stretch for the draft. Here are the results from Round 6.
11:55 AM
Everett Silvertips defenseman Eric Jamieson was selected by the Calgary Flames with their sixth-round pick. Jamieson is the third Silvertip to be selected so far.
11:35 AM
Round 5 is in the books. Lots of WHL players selected in this round.
11:19 AM
With that newly acquired selection, the Kraken have taken Clarke Caswell from the Swift Current Broncos. This was their fourth selection from the WHL this draft. This seems like a good value pick, as Caswell was ranked 79th on the SOH Big Board.
11:18 AM
The Kraken made a trade to move up in the draft. They traded their sixth-round pick (169) and seventh-round pick (201) for Florida’s fifth-round pick (141).
11:01 AM
With the addition of center Oliver Josephson, the Kraken have now selected 15 centers since they came into the league. This is the second-most centers selected by any team since 2021, behind only the Chicago Blackhawks, who have taken 17. Several of these players will be converted to wing should they make the NHL, but it is an interesting data point in the Kraken’s draft strategy.
10:58 AM
Here are the results from Round 4.
10:24 AM
The Seattle Kraken selected another center, Oliver Josephson, with their fourth-round selection. Josephson is another shutdown-type forward. He plays for Red Deer in the WHL, so there should be plenty of opportunities to see him roll through Washington State when Red Deer plays the US teams.
10:20 AM
Round 3 is a wrap.
10:05 AM
With the 88th overall pick, the Kraken selected goalie Kim Saarinen from the HPK U20 team. Saarinen was predicted by Curtis in his Seattle Kraken mock draft earlier this week. This is the third Finnish goalie the team has selected over the last three drafts.
9:45 AM
With their first selection in the third round, the Seattle Kraken select defenseman Alexis Bernier from Baie-Comeau Drakkar of the QMJHL. This is the first defenseman the Kraken have selected.
9:35 AM
That is the end of Round 2.
9:30 AM
With their second selection of the second round and 63rd overall, the Seattle Kraken selected centerman Nathan Villeneuve from the Sudbury Wolves of the OHL. As you might recall, one of Seattle’s top prospects, David Goyette, also played with Sudbury this season.
“Villeneuve’s a feisty, high-pace attacker with a lockdown defensive game. When he’s not throwing hits and winning battles, he’s eliminating off-puck threats and pickpocketing the puck carrier. When the puck arrives on his stick, he instantly takes the middle or starts a give-and-go to attack the zone with speed.” – Elite Prospects
9:15 AM
Another trade. We identified Tanner Jeannot as a good trade target for the Seattle Kraken, and at this price, it seemed reasonable, but it was not meant to be.
9:00 AM
A couple of semi-big trades have been announced:
- Utah acquired defenseman Mikhail Sergachev from the Tampa Bay Lightning in exchange for defenseman JJ Moser, center Conor Geekie, a 2025 second-round pick, and their 2024 seventh-round pick (No. 199 overall).
- Utah also acquired defenseman John Marino from New Jersey in exchange for their 49th overall pick of the 2024 Draft and a 2025 second-round pick.
8:45 AM
The Seattle Kraken selected Julius Miettinen from the Everett Silvertips. Miettinen, an import from Finland, is known as a strong two-way center. He really shined in the back half of the season with Everett.
We also got a few firsts in the 2024 Draft. The first Swedish player was selected 35th overall, and the first goalie of the draft, Ilya Nabokov, was taken 38th overall.
8:30 AM – Round 2
Let’s begin Day 2! The Kraken will be selecting 40th and 63rd in this round.
8:00 AM
The Kraken will start the day with eight picks remaining in the 2024 NHL draft.
A couple things from Round 1 that I wanted to call out from yesterday before we get going:
- For the third time ever, NCAA players went first and second overall in the NHL Draft. The last time this happened was in 2021 when Owen Power and Matty Beniers were selected back-to-back. The only other time was in 2000 when Rick DiPietro and Dany Heatley went first and second, respectively.
- The run on defensemen did not occur as early as many analysts predicted. Most people expected a group of blueliners to start hearing their names called around the fifth overall pick.
- This is the first time since 2010 that no Swedes were taken in the first round. Last year, six Swedes were selected on Day 1 of the draft, including second overall Leo Carlsson.
- The 19 Canadian players selected in the first round Friday tied a mark set in 2020 for the most Canadians selected in the first round.
Here are the full results of the first round:
On a personal note, Marshawn Lynch is probably my favorite athlete of all-time.
Another center… 😂
and another and another 🙂
Not only did we not get Tanner Jeannot… we get to play against him three or four times.
I think that’s bad news for Tye Kartye.
3 centers as the first 3 picks. Julius Miettinen has the size of a winger but 4 out of 8 picks are centers. Even the draft announcers spoke of the leagues players are getting bigger and they state the reason being that the game is played more on the boards than the center of the ice. When D-men are 6’5″ and bigger, the also have longer sticks. Thus, there is no room to players to break through so every move goes to the outside. Not only are centers small but they do not have the reach to go around the big D-men. Just like last year when Tanev and Gourde and Matty had to take it to the boards, they got mugged and pushed off the puck. I am afraid that Francis sealed his fate with this daft draft along with his failure to keep or sign big dominate players.
For two years Shane Wright and Juraj Slafkovský have been tied together in a comparative mist that has been occlusive. Montreal fans will never really know about Slafkovský until they know about Wright. One of the things I am most looking forward to next season… we finally get to start measuring the 2022 draft.
For me – and I will not forget this – the 2024 draft will not be measured by Berkly Catton. It will be measured by Catton and Zeev Buium. Not Parekh or Silayev or Dickinson – though they were all there – the measure of Catton will be – for me – Buium… in the same way Slafkovsky will now be measured against Wright.
https://soundofhockey.com/2024/02/28/goalie-game-how-a-simple-idea-snowballed-into-the-talk-of-the-hockey-world/amp/
What the kraken would look like if Francis was a goalie. 😂