Many NHL franchises have landed top-tier NHL talent in the second and third rounds when prospective players fall from previously created hypothetical draft simulations.
The New York Rangers have held 5 second-round draft picks between 2019 and 2022. Of the five players, one has suited up at the NHL level. WHo are the New York Ranger’s last five third-round draft selections?
2019:
Zac Jones (68th overall): Jones replaced Cale Makar for the UMass Minutemen in the Hockey East Conference from 2019 to 2021. He won the 2021 NCAA National Championship in his college tenure. Since then, he has played stints in the World’s Most Famous Arena and for the Hartford Wolf Pack.
This season may be his final shot to make the Rangers roster. He will compete with Ben Harpur and Matthew Robertson to earn a bottom pairing role.
Jones’s size has always been a point of contention. The Rangers simply couldn’t field a defense that consisted of Lundkvist, Jones, and although a super-star, Adam Fox. Teams that win don’t have three sub-six-foot defensemen on their back end no matter how much the game is evolving.
In Jones’s thirty-eight NHL contests, he’s posted one goal and six assists. His fate rests in what the new coaching regime sees fit for the big club’s identity on the back end.
2020:
Oliver Tarnstrom (92nd overall): The Rangers drafted a six-foot-tall Swedish center who at the time was just seventeen years old.
Tarnstrom has never played in America and will play for Brynas IF in the Hockey Allsvenskan league in 2023-2024.
2021:
Jayden Grubbe (65th overall): Grubbe was the compensation pick the New York Rangers received from moving Jimmy Vesey in the 2019 off-season.
The massive forward played his last three seasons in the Western Hockey League, where he captained his team to twenty-two playoff games in the last two seasons.
The Rangers recently traded Grubbe to the Edmonton Oilers in exchange for a fifth-round pick in the 2023 entry-level draft.
Ryder Korczak (75th overall): The Yorkton native posted exceptional back-to-back seasons for the Moose Jaw Warriors of the WHL, recording one hundred and forty-eight points in one hundred and sixteen contests. Korczak skated in five games for the Wolf Pack this season, recording 0 points.
He is a deceptive puck handler that can shimmy and shake when he possesses the rock, has an angle-changing curl and drag shot, and can open passing lanes on the power play with these tools.
2022:
Bryce McConnell-Barker (97th overall): The OHL Soo Greyhounds captain posted a seventy-seven-point campaign in 2022-2023. He is considered timely in how he supports the puck and his teammates positions on the ice and executes a fine shutdown game as a centerman.
NHL Central Scouting had the London native ranked as the number thirty-four skater prior to the 2022 NHL entry-level draft.
2023:
The New York Rangers own the 91st overall pick in the upcoming draft. The franchise acquired the pick when they traded Alexander Georgiev to Colorado.