The New Jersey Devils need to look at the World Juniors Championships when thinking of their top pick in the NHL Draft.
With Alexis Lafreniere currently injured on Saturday, we still don’t know how long the Quebec native will be out. The knee injury he suffered had to scare the New Jersey Devils, who are looking for the number-one overall pick.
However, he’s a young man and this probably won’t hurt or change the outlook of his stock price going into 2020. He already has one goal and three assists. Lafreniere did display in the USA game that if you try to double him up tight, he still finds ways to find the open man. He’s proven to be a lethal and very hard to contain playmaker, and wouldn’t be surprised if he gets compared to Sidney Crosby at his age.
Although Canada had a very miserable game against Russia on Saturday, what stood out was when Quinton Byfield didn’t have the puck, he was going after the puck carrier and stepping in where Lafreniere would’ve been. He showed that he can play a 200-foot game, and was very calm and skated into the offensive zone with ease.
Despite being a power forward at his age and size, he’s only going to continue to grow. Byfield was strong along the boards gaining puck possession in the Russian trapezoid which could’ve resulted in a scoring chance. Once he breaks loose for Canada, more scouts will drool to have him in their top two.
Having watched a good amount of the Sweden vs. Switzerland game, it became clear that two of the top 5 players in this years draft are Lucas Raymond and Alexander Holtz. Lucas Raymond is a forward who switched from top of the enemy blue line and bolted to the Swiss high danger zone and made an amazing assist on the Swedish scoring drive. Another thing about Lucas is on one of the next scoring drives the Swiss defense left him open on the right wing below the mid-danger scoring area and one-timed it in. Anyone going after Lucas Raymond he can be a bit of a playmaker and a sniper in one depending if you draft him 3-5.