The NHL Draft is just over a month away, with the big event taking place at the Sphere on June 28. Las Vegas is becoming a big destination for everything hockey-related, as made evident by the NHL Awards Ceremony happening at Fontainebleau. But for the draft, it raises some questions about which young pieces will fall where.
With the offseason comes a sea of potential free agents and draft picks for NHL teams to select. They offer various services and can either bolster or hinder a team's chances of winning. For the Vegas Golden Knights, they have a wave of options to tackle this upcoming offseason. That includes possibly drafting Ryder Ritchie, a promising prospect.
The young forward has the potential to fit in well as a Golden Knight. Players that play hard every time they're near the puck are treasured in Bruce Cassidy's system. They become impact players who become memorable among passionate Golden Knights fans. Luckily for Ritchie, he might fall to the 19th pick at the NHL Draft and prove himself within Cassidy's system.
The urgency to fill bodies and add depth at the forward position is urgent for the Golden Knights. With almost two lines worth of forwards becoming unrestricted free agents this summer, holes must be addressed by general manager Kelly McCrimmon and company. That might include picking Ritchie with the 19th pick and developing him into a key figure for the Golden Knights.
But there's much more to the Calgary native than simply being a projected first-round pick. He didn't just get to being projected as a first-round pick by sheer luck, you know. What can Ritchie bring to the Golden Knights if he's picked in the first round? What aspects must the young forward improve on to become a factor in the NHL?