After moving up from seventh to first in the EURO League’s Season 7 draft, the Geneva Generals cemented a spot on their blueline for now and the long-term in selecting Canadian Colton Parayko first overall.

Parayko has no deficiencies aside from inexperience and he was blessed with 6-6 size and exceptional hockey smarts. He could step right into a starting role on the Generals to help guard goaltender Frederik Andersen. Geneva’s defense corps is uncertain at the moment with four veterans negotiating new contracts with General Manager Andy Rolling.

Dennis Wideman has a EURO Cup on his resume and he has only missed four of all the games in Geneva’s history. Jay Boumeester, Jason Garrison and Gerhard Unterluggauer are, like Wideman, without contracts for the time being. Parayko’s appearance on the scene gives Rolling a little more leverage during contract talks with the veterans. The other two defensive starters from last season, Swede Carl Gunnarsson and Czech Karel Rachunek, are signed through Season 7.

With the second pick of the draft St. Petersburg surprised some observers by taking Finnish forward Patrik Laine. Laine grew up only a six-hour drive from St. Petersburg in Tampere. Laine can really fire the puck and he’s crafty despite his young age. He won’t play right away but it might not be too many years when he, Jonathan Huberdeau and Jan Kovar are terrorizing Krasnyye Zvezdy (Red Stars) opponents.

Auston Matthews, an American who played for Zurich in a lesser European league, will ship out for Copenhagen, Denmark, going third in the draft. Big and skilled, with a lot of experience against men, Matthews is regarded by some as a “franchise player.” He is a dream building block for Copenhagen, a team in transition with not a lot of stars, Marko Dano, Andre Burakovsky and Jonathan Drouin are among the young stars on the team who should benefit from Matthews’ presence in the future.

Viktor Antipin, 20,  is already an expert in defensive hockey, filling shot lanes like no one else could this past season. This season, he will have offensive gem Shayne Gostisbehere alongside to complement him, thanks to GM Chris Lee’s selection for Oslo at fourth overall. It’s such a logical fit, that Lee might have taken Gostisbehere with the first pick of the draft. The Outlaws have a promising young goalie in Semyon Varlamov as well as forwards Connor McDavid, Tyler Seguin and Tomas Hertl up front. The Oulaws better starting looking into new neighborhoods because it looks like their lease on the league’s basement apartment expired today.

Bern and new GM Paja Jansson scooped up the best goalie in the draft when they took 21-year-old Finn Joonas Korpisalo with the fifth pick. The youngster is athletic and cool in the crease, although scouts would like him to put on a few more pounds of muscle. In Bern, there is great competition for the starting and backup goalie jobs. If Mike Smith’s contract is renewed, and if Thomas Greiss’ is as well, Korpisalo might have to wait a few years for his shot. If both free agent goalies leave, however, the draftee might slot in as the backup to Jan Laco, 31, who started 44 games for Bern last year and posted a 90.8 save percentage. Either way, the Interrail have a goalie in place for the next decade.

If the NHL’s Edmonton Oilers take their time with Jesse Puljujarvi, then Edinburgh will have a big, skilled forward who will shield the puck well and set up teammates whenever he sees an opening. The selection gives GM John Charles his second high-profile Finnish right winger. Mikko Rantanen, who was drafted at the top of the second round last year by Milan and was traded twice since. First, Rantanen went to Belfast for Robbie Fabbri and a third-round pick. Them Belfast shipped him off to Edinburgh as one of parts in the big Sidney Crosby for Claude Giroux trade. The Captials already have a logjam of young right wingers, with Sam Reinhart and Kevin Hayes also there.

Matthew Tkachuk will be living in Italy after being taken seventh overall by the Guerriero. Keith’s son is big and has a nose for the net. He is tough and won’t get pushed around, but he probably won’t pile up the penalty minutes. Like Puljujarvi and the rest of the prospects in the draft, his first season in the NHL will determine how good he is in the EURO league because that’s how he will get his Websim attributes. If Tkachuk develops as expected, he will join a huge battle for ice time in Milan, where GM David Bell has turned the team into Young Talent R Us. On the right side alone are three 80-plus potential skaters who are 26 or younger in Tyler Johnson, Tomas Zaborsky and Par Arlbrandt.

Another prospect went eighth in the draft when Prague grabbed Mikhail Sergachev, a Russian defenseman who will learn his hockey in the Montreal Canadiens system. He has everything you’d want in a defenseman: size, speed and toughness. And when he played with Windsor in the Ontario Hockey League, he showed what he can do with a puck by scoring 17 goals and 57 points. On Prague’s roster, he should eventually be playing with the likes of Torey Krug, Czech Vladimir Roth and Switzerland-native Robin Grossman.

With no forwards younger than 26 and with three good young defensemen on the roster already, winger Pierre Luc Dubois was a good selection at 9 overall for the Dublin Fighting Irish. He is big and skilled, he reminds some of Anze Kopitar, but apparently has more of a mean streak. Dublin’s Dubois will have to wait his turn in line on the wing for a couple of seasons, but he will be an offensive threat for many years in this league. General Manager Gayle Rock would get a boost if Nikolai Goldobin and Brendan Perlini can go from prospects to useful players too. 

Anthony Duclair is crafty and talented with the puck and he keeps his motor running for games at a time. As the 10th pick in the draft, Duclair, 20, gives Zurich the young offensive left winger it was missing. Dmitrij Jaskin, 22, is on the right wing and Ryan Strome, 24, is the best of three young centers on the Lions’ roster. Duclair, Jaskin and Strome are all 82 PO or better. Zurich has plenty of young defensemen and two young goalies already, so it made a lot of sense for them to go after a left wing.

American Jaccob Slavin is the kind of defenseman who prefers to be unnoticed back there. Big hits and risky plays with the puck are not for him. At 21, Slavin may not break into the Copenhagen Trident lineup right away, but Martin Sayle, the team’s new and second-ever general manager, has a nice young pairing in place in Slavin and puck-moving Noah Hanafin.

Bratislava GM Chuck Massaro was hoping Slavin would fall to him at pick number 12, but Sayle ruined his life. Connor Hellebuyck, a 6-4 22-year-old goalie from Michigan, becomes an Eagle and he joins Swiss netminder Leonardo Genoni as the long-term occupants of the key position. Massaro is anxious to see Genoni in action, although he and Coach Brent Sutter have butted heads on when would be the best time to introduce the 25-year-old to EURO action. Bratislava’s goaltending situation is up in the air because the veterans who shared the crease last season – Corey Crawford and Marc-Andre Fleury – are both unrestricted free agents. Massaro has said he definitely wants to sign at least one veteran for two or more seasons but is unsure if he will be able to afford two vets.

With the 13th pick of draft, Moscow’s Ron Lavallee went with a mobile, well-rounded defenseman who the NHL’s Vancouver Canaucks liked enough to pick 5th in their draft in Buffalo in June. Olli Juolevi is a 6-3, 180 pound teen who will join Travis Sanheim among the team’s prospect defensemen. On Moscow’s current roster, there are three defensemen 26 or younger: Nick Leddy, 26; Jyri Marttinen, 25; and Eric Andersson, 22, so there should be room for Juolevi and Sanheim in the future. Juolevi has the potential to be the best of all of them.

Playmaker Ryan Spooner was selected 14th overall by London. The 23-year-old has great hands, is very effective on the powerplay, and he isn’t far off from being EURO-ready. On the Dons’ depth chart at center, however, he’s sixth, assuming London and Tyler Bozak come to terms on another contract. The Dons also have prospects William Nylander and Travis Konecny on their way up to the big team, so they look pretty set for the long term at center.

Munich took a dip into the prospect pool to acquire another playmakerin American Clayton Keller, who is a part of the U.S. National Under 18 team. He lit it up for the USA, scoring 37 goals and 70 points in 62 games last season. He will stop at Boston University and the NHL’s Arizona Coyotes before heading over to Germany. When he gets there, he will be part of a group of youngsters that includes Filip Forsberg, Sean Monahan, Fyodor Malykhin, Nikita Zadorov and Jindrich Barak, among others.

Tyson Jost is a great skater and he was capatin of his Penticton team in the BCHL, racking up 104 points in 48 games. A dynamic player. He is one of the brightest stars in the Colorado Avalanche system and their top-ranked prospect center. Helsinki drafted him 16th overall, but in the morning, when GM Trevor Grimm finds out he only had 43 penalty minutes, he is likely to be traded. How are the Jokerit going to continue to lead the EURO in PIMs with players like that?

Alexander Nylander kind of expected London to draft him so that he could play with brother William in the future, but instead he joins Keller on the Munich Dire Wolf. Like his brother and father Michael, Nylander is slick with the puck and quite creative. Scouts say Alexander might be a better two-way player than either of the guys in his family. He was drafted in the first round of the NHL draft by the Buffalo Sabres. Munich GM Mike Felter hopes the Sabres don’t rush him into action so he can play in Felter’s hometown of Rochester and gain some seasoning before getting his Websim attributes.

Competitive and determined defenseman Jakob Chychrun joins the St. Petersburg Krasnyye Zvezdy, joining seven other prospects who are waiting on the farm team in Yaroslavl for their Websim attributes. Chychrun is a well-rounded player in the Arizona Coyotes system. The Red Stars’ current blueline corps consists of players in the 26-32 age range and the hope is that when they filter out, Chychrun will be ready to get his 6-2 body into the action.

Mississauga, Ontario’s Michael McLeod has good size, skill and skating ability and he was selected 19th overall by the Copenhagen Tridents. Earlier in the draft, Trident GM Martin Sayle selected Auston Matthews, and with Nick Petan, Vince Trochek and Simon Hjalmarsson already in the system, Copenhagen has really shored up the center position for the future. McLeod will learn his trade in the New Jersey Devils system.

In Moscow, there’s a long list of centers on the current roster and four more on the prospects list. Long tall center Logan Brown, of the Ottawa Senators system, was added to the list when the Dynamo took him 20th in the draft, but he probably won’t stay at the end of the list for long. Scouts like his all-around game and especially his size.

Jake Bean joins the Edinburgh prospects list and is one of three young defensemen who have a chance to play behind Adam Larsson and Gurkan Cetinkaya in a few years. Those two men are both 25 and destined to be the team’s topdefense pair. Joe Morrow and Brett Pesce (drafted early in the second round) join Bean as the team’s young stock. Bean is viewed as natural at offense who plays a thoughtful game in his own end.

For the second time in the first round, Prague selected a prospect defenseman when they took Dennis Cholowski, who plays in the Detroit Red Wings system and will suit up for St. Cloud State University. Prague General manager Peter Ott has a strong defense corps in place for several years, so it’s too early to envision how Cholowski can fit in. His value will become clearer once players like Justin Schultz, Dmitri Kulikov and Roman Josi are no longer contributing.

Jake McCabe is sturdy and calm back on defense and defending is definitely his prime concern. It’s unlikely that McCabe will break into the Copenhagen lineup this year, and among Trident players his own age, McCabe falls below Dougie Hamilton, Noah Hanifin and probably fellow Season 7 draftee Jaccob Slavin, but McCabe will eventually be a solid choice for a second pair on defense who can also kill penalties.

Champion Minsk had four centers on its prospects list coming into the draft. Now they have five. With the final selection of the first round, GM Igor Kirunov went with German Rubtsov, who plays in Russia and was selected in the NHL draft 22nd overall by Philadelphia. He scored 12 goals and had 14 assists in 28 games with Team Russia’s Under 18 team.

Sixteen prospects were taken among the 24 picks of the first round.

I probably won’t write about the rest of the draft.