2012 NHL Draft Selections' Strong Beginning to the 2012-13 Season

With the exception of three second round picks (Nic Kerdiles---Anaheim, # 36 overall; Brian
Hart--Tampa Bay, #53 overall; and Jordan Martinook--Phoenix, # 58 overall), all of the 2012
first and second round selections have seen action early in the 2012-13 season. Had there not
been an NHL lockout, several of these players would be skating for NHL teams, but, at this time,

of the 60 players selected in the first two rounds, 31 are currently playing in the CHL, 14 on
college teams, 9 are in Europe, and 6 are skating for AHL teams.

Several players in each of the CHL, Europe, the NCAA and AHL have quickly jumped out of the
gate. Of particular interest are the players mentioned below. All stats include games through the
October 22, 2012.

 All it took was one moment - a rut in the ice that changed the course of the season for Alex Galchenyuk. Nearly six months after sustaining a serious injury, he made his return to the line-up and was impressive in his outings during the remainder of the season. The way he played after his injury, coupled with the impressive showings in the massive amount of viewings from his rookie season, prompted us to raise Galchenyuk to the #1 spot for the 2012 NHL Entry Draft.

HockeyProspect.com has a new number one ranked player in our 2012 overall NHL Draft Rankings. Sarnia Sting Centre Alex Galchenyuk as our new #1 ranked player.

HockeyProspect.com’s Mark Edwards spoke about the change at the top, “In December I said to a few of our staff that if Galchenyuk came back this year and proved to be healthy he had a good chance of being our top ranked player. Two short years ago I liked Seguin over Hall and we ranked him #1. I don’t regret that ranking and I feel very confident that Galchenyuk will live up to our #1 billing in 2012. Ryan (Ryan Yessie HP Ontario scout) spoke as far back as last June about this season’s number one. We were high on Alex being our pre-season number one until I saw Galchenyuk in Rochester in July. He looked like he put on a few pounds and we figured we would go with Yakupovto start the season.” Grigorenko was the other part of the puzzle heading into the season, but he has underwhelmed all three of HP’s QMJHL scouts too often this season. “Grigorenko is fine player but he’s not in the mix at the top as far as we are concerned.” Edwards explained. As far as the top two players are concerned HockeyProspect.com scouts have seen the Sarnia twosome play live over 150 times during the past two seasons.