NY Rangers address major need by landing smooth skating defensive titan headed to NCAA

The New York Rangers' second pick at the 2025 NHL Draft is a young defenseman from Scottsdale, Arizona that will take his talents to Manhattan.

Sean Barnhill is an 18-year-old from the USHL's Dubuque Fighting Saints was described as "an animal" by the NHL Network draft panel, and Barnhill shows that with 54 games this season for the Saints, with 4 goals and 8 assists for 12 points. Barnhill also is committed to play for Northeastern University this fall.

Barnhill is a developing two-way defenseman with a stature as big as New York itself. Standing at 6'5" and weighing a hefty 214 lbs., he makes a solid case for teams looking for defensemen with some offensive prowess to boot. Besides playing with Dubuque, Barnhill also spent time with the BCHL's Nanaimo Clippers, although he only played four total games with them before moving to Dubuque full time.

While Barnhill is a two-way defenseman, always a good thing, his scoring totals could use some work. He's not a high end scorer, but his passing skills are top notch, not to mention his already obvious physicality is another major upside to the Rangers, who could up their hit game alongside Matt Rempe. Barnhill was also a top penalty killer for Dubuque, and that's another major aspect the Rangers could drastically improve on.

Barnhill's main strengths are his NHL caliber frame and mobility, his overall defensive positional awareness, his ability to go after the loose puck, and his solid puck management, making him an ideal candidate for the Rangers, a team in need of players that can hang onto the puck for long periods of time. On the other end of the spectrum, Barnhill's lack of scoring (although he is a D), low hit rate for someone his size and puck management under immense pressure are things that need some fine tuning.

Barnhill ranks as follows across multiple prospect ranking sites: 73rd in the consolidated ranking, 67th by Elite Prospects, 91st by FloHockey, and 64th by NHL Central Scouting, making him a reasonable 3rd round choice. That has obviously happened and while this pick may seem like a step back from the Rangers' first pick at number 43 with Erie's Malcolm Spence, they'll have one more pick in the 3rd round at number 89, followed by five additional picks in the remaining 4th through 7th rounds.