Is Shane Wright still #1? What’s at stake in the NHL Draft Lottery

Shane Wright entered the 2021-22 season as the consensus #1 pick for the 2022 NHL Entry Draft. He was viewed by many scouts as a true elite prospect, a potential star #1 center. After receiving special status for the OHL as a 15-year-old, he promptly scored 39 goals in 58 OHL games. He scored 9 goals and 14 points in 5 games at the U-18 World Cup as a minor. He was on his way to stardom and it seemed inevitable that he would have a great draft season.

Then the season started and Wright slowly came out of the gates. He had 8 points in 8 games in the opening month of the season. It also didn’t seem particularly effective in the games I watched. Various reasonable reasons for his less-than-exceptional play came from across the NHL, with viewers pointing to sample size or his missed 2020-21 season as factors that could result in a slow start.

It’s hard to speculate on how much the missed season affected player development, but it’s worth noting that it didn’t stop Dallas’ Wyatt Johnston or Seattle’s Ryan Winterton from being among the top scorers in points/game to belong in the OHL. However, Wright showed his strength in the second half and ended up in the top 10 of the OHL rankings.

Wright’s stats always looked great, but I’ll admit that I’ve only seen him a couple of times and been really blown away: the opening game of the U17 Challenge and his U18 World Cup match against Sweden. He scored a hat-trick in both. The obvious caveat here is that he was always so young that I reasonably concluded that age was why he didn’t consistently have great games.

However, these past viewings provide information about this season’s. I’ve spoken to scouts about what they saw, and I’ve watched over a dozen Kingston games, both live and via video. The takeaway and common thought in the industry is that Wright simply lacks the dynamic athleticism and ability that you typically associate with a No. 1 pick. He’s a fine player and NHL prospect, but he doesn’t have the skating of Nathan MacKinnon, the hands of Patrick Kane, or the shot of Steven Stamkos. I’ve historically considered Wright’s shot elite, but it didn’t look like it this season, and in fact he had twice as many assists as goals. Wright is just a very versatile player, which admittedly can be boring for a first overall pick. Because of this, he’s projected by scouts as Patrice Bergeron and Ryan O’Reilly, both of whom, mind you, weren’t selected in the first round as they lacked some of those dynamic elements. You can argue that this is a risky projection for a teenager when there isn’t a very big talent high side to hit. However, similar descriptions could be used for the top two picks in the 2021 draft in Owen Power and Matthew Beniers. My current counterpart for Wright would be Rangers center Mika Zibanejad.

Wright has been quite productive this season, but compared to the CHL’s top contenders, it’s clear he’s not at the level you’re used to from a first pick overall in terms of dominating his respective CHL leagues are.

Shane Wright’s grip on No. 1 has yet to be questioned in part as there is no obvious climber this season. Logan Cooley is a terrific prospect but has 36 points in 24 USHL games. Joakim Kemell got off to a flying start in the Liiga but has slowed down significantly since then, and the same can be said to a lesser extent for Matthew Savoie in the WHL. Juraj Slafkovsky had a great game at the Olympics and overall has been impressive in international play for the last two seasons, but despite the good recent weeks with his club his overall Liiga performance is not amazing.

(Robert Lefebvre / OHL Images)

“You keep a player overall in the beginning based mostly on what they’ve done over the past few seasons, not their draft season,” said an NHL executive. “I find that dangerous.” That’s a reasonable thought, and I’ve thought about it more than once. Most NHL scouts I’ve spoken to about Wright admit they won’t step up for him when picking the No. 1, but they also admit he would be their pick simply because there’s no obvious alternative. There were several scouts in the first half of the season who argued to me that Logan Cooley was a plausible alternative, but less recently after Cooley failed to light it this season. Of late, some scouts have argued that Slafkovsky is Wright’s main challenger, with a minority suggesting they would indeed take the Slovakia winger if given first choice.

However, Wright and Slafkovsky’s seasons are not over yet. With the CHL playoffs delayed, we’re yet to see how Wright fares in the postseason. Could Kingston’s early exit create more uncertainty for the No. 1? What if they topple OHL favorite Hamilton? What if Slafkovsky has a big World Championship with NHL players in attendance? These are questions that still need to be answered on the eve of the lottery.

Extrapolations when a player is 18 years old are not guaranteed. Just because Wright doesn’t look like a No. 1 pick doesn’t mean he can’t be. There have been times when a No.1 pick like Nico Hischier in 2017 and Ryan Nugent-Hopkins in 2011 didn’t excite you as much and that was predictable in the end, despite being very good players. There were also years like Aaron Ekblad in 2014 and Patrick Kane in 2007 – players who weren’t consensus #1 and ended up becoming legitimate staples. There are also years like 2020 when Alexis Lafreniere looked like a star-to-be, and that hasn’t happened, at least until now.

There are still some scouts who believe strongly in Wright and believe he will be a true star in the NHL and would appreciate the opportunity to pick him. Personally, I also believe he’s being projected as a first-line center, someone who can be a top 15-20 center in the league. However, as the season has progressed, scouts have become more cautious about projecting Wright, and there are some reviewers who aren’t as high as I am.

Wright remains the crown jewel for the team that wins the lottery. Right now I’m having a hard time seeing one team take another like Slafkovsky because it stays tight between the two at best and teams tend to center when things get tight. Wright is likely to become a very important player for the NHL organization that selects him. But he’s unsure if he’ll become a legitimate NHL star or league top scorer, and as the lottery balls begin to swirl, the story of the top of the 2022 NHL draft has yet to be fully written.

(Photo above: Claus Andersen/Getty Images)