{"id":220396,"date":"2022-07-09T12:54:30","date_gmt":"2022-07-09T17:54:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/?p=220396"},"modified":"2022-07-09T18:56:42","modified_gmt":"2022-07-09T23:56:42","slug":"nhl-draft-recap-juraj-slafkovsky-takes-surprise-first-round-pick","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/nhl-draft-recap-juraj-slafkovsky-takes-surprise-first-round-pick\/","title":{"rendered":"NHL Draft Recap: Juraj Slafkovsk\u00fd is the Surprise First Round Pick"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Shane Wright was expected to be the first draft pick of the night. But in a surprising twist, the first two picks went to Slovakian players.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_220397\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-220397\" data-style=\"width: 1440px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-220397 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/Screen-Shot-2022-07-09-at-10.24.36-AM.png\" alt=\"Juraj Slafkovsk\u00fd \" width=\"1440\" height=\"962\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/Screen-Shot-2022-07-09-at-10.24.36-AM.png 1440w, https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/Screen-Shot-2022-07-09-at-10.24.36-AM-858x573.png 858w, https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/Screen-Shot-2022-07-09-at-10.24.36-AM-430x287.png 430w, https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/Screen-Shot-2022-07-09-at-10.24.36-AM-238x158.png 238w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1440px) 100vw, 1440px\" \/><figcaption  id=\"caption-attachment-220397\"class=\"text-description\">Juraj Juraj Slafkovsk\u00fd (center) stands arm in arm with the Canadiens general manager, Kent Hughes (left) after his draft pick on Thursday night. Slafkovsky was the first overall pick. (Image: Bruce Bennett)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">For the first time in three years, fans were allowed to attend the NHL Draft in Montreal&#8217;s Bell Centre. With the Montreal Canadiens holding the first overall pick, the night has fans sitting at the edge of their seat.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<div class=\"callout\">\n<p>When draft day started, Shane Wright was the consensus #1 pick at -200 on Fanduel, with Juraj Slafkovsk\u00fd\u00a0 at +170 to go first. But by 6 pm, as the draft was just an hour away, those odds changed, and Slafkovsk\u00fd\u00a0 became the favorite, closing at -160 to be the first overall pick, while Wright was at +115.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>Some information must have leaked somewhere for Wright to go from -200 to +115 in a matter of hours. That&#8217;s because when it came time for the Canadiens to pick, sure enough, Slafkovsk\u00fd was their man, as the big Left Winger from Slovakia was picked first overall, becoming the first Slovakian to be picked number one.<\/p>\n<p>So, depending on when you got a bet in on Slafkovsk\u00fd,\u00a0 you could have gotten him anywhere from -160 to +170 on Thursday.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"500\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Best moment of the <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/2022NHLDraft?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">#2022NHLDraft<\/a>, and it\u2019s not even close \ud83c\uddf8\ud83c\uddf0 <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/bgUtGFS6IT\">pic.twitter.com\/bgUtGFS6IT<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; The Hockey News (@TheHockeyNews) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/TheHockeyNews\/status\/1545238408892760067?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">July 8, 2022<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<h2>Slovakia Takes the Night<\/h2>\n<p>The Slovakian theme continued as \u0160imon Nemec was picked second overall.<\/p>\n<div class=\"callout\">\n<p>Wright didn\u2019t even go third overall. In fact, that distinction went to Logan Cooley, who was +2600 to go first overall. He was the first center taken off the board, and even though he is committed to playing for the University of Minnesota next year, the forever re-building Arizona Coyotes thought he was the right man at this pick.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>After sitting around for what must have felt like an eternity, Wright\u2019s name was called at pick number four to the Seattle Kraken. The Kingston Frontenacs center had to wait through 3 picks and two trades.<\/p>\n<p>As for the Slovakian theme, The Montreal Canadiens also had a pick at number 26, and they added Slafkovsk\u00fd&#8217;s teammate and friend, Filip Me\u0161\u00e1r from Slovakia. That put a cap on the first round for the Canadiens, marking the third Slovakian picked in the first round.<\/p>\n<p><strong>To put that in perspective, only one Slovakian had been drafted in the first round in the last 10 years, and the highest ever drafted Slovakian was Marian Gaborik, taken by the Minnesota Wild with the third overall pick in 2000.<\/strong><\/p>\n<h2>Picks and Trades<\/h2>\n<p>Following the third overall pick, Commissioner Gary Bettman stepped to the microphone and announced the first trades of the night, both involving the hometown Montreal Canadiens, to the crowd\u2019s delight.<\/p>\n<p>Montreal traded away Defenseman Alexander Romanov and pick #98 (round 4, 1<sup>st<\/sup> pick &#8211; Isaiah George \u2013 D &#8211; OHL) to the New York Islanders for the #13 pick (Frank Nazar \u2013 C \u2013 USA NTDP) overall. But as fast as the Habs acquired the pick, they shipped it off the Chicago Blackhawks along with pick #66 (round 3, 1<sup>st<\/sup> pick &#8211; Gavin Hayes \u2013 LW &#8211; OHL) for Center Kirby Dach.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Shane Wright was expected to be the first draft pick of the night. But in a surprising twist, the first two picks went to Slovakian players. For the first time in three years, fans were allowed to attend the NHL Draft in Montreal&#8217;s Bell Centre. With the Montreal Canadiens holding the first overall pick, the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":76,"featured_media":220397,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,1074],"tags":[],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>NHL Draft Recap: Juraj Slafkovsk\u00fd is the Surprise First Round Pick - Casino.org<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Shane Wright was expected to be the first draft pick of the night. But in a surprising twist, the first two picks went to Slovakian players. 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