Panthers Draft Recap- 1 of 2 (2010 Edition)

 A little late for an article, but here is a look at the Panthers 2010 draft. The team headed into the draft with 3 picks in the top 14, though the team dealt the 14th pick for young centre Travis Zajac to play on the teams top line this year. At the end of the day the Panthers selected 5 forwards, 4 defenseman and 2 goalies with their 11 picks, including 4 overagers. At the end of the day, GM Wilson was pretty happy. " I think with our 3 drafts at the helm here in Florida, we have amassed a lot of good young talent for the future of the team. I firmly believe we are in the final  stages of this rebuild and will be more focusing on being competitive now. We have tons of elite talent through the pipeline and the core of the team is built. We have a great young goalie in Mason, with depth behind him. We have great young D in Fowler, Pietrangelo, Gunnarsson, Del Zotto and Barker. And top notch young forwards in Duchene, Seguin, Ennis, Kreider and Zajac. Things are really looking up for this franchise." Now a look at the picks from the Panthers 2010 entry draft.

2^nd Overall Pick

Tyler Seguin, Centre, Plymouth Whalers

Born: January 31, 1992  Brampton,Ont

HT: 6’1”  WT: 186 lbs

GM’s Take:

“He is a great reward, for an awful year. We were the worst this year, and yet we still were picking 2^nd again this year, but this time we held onto the pick and picked a great talent. Seguin is a great player for us, he can score and he can pass, making everyone around him better which is what you need from your centre. Having him and (Matt) Duchene as our top 2 centres of the future, I feel like we have the position solidified and we can focus more on other areas and be confident on what we have here.

7th Overall Pick

Cam Fowler, Defense, Windsor Spitfires

Born: December 6, 1991  Farmington Hill, MI

HT: 6’2”  WT: 190 lbs

GM’s Take:

“We traded for this pick, because we hoped that a great young talent like this would fall to us. And luckily he did. Fowler is such a great defenseman that just creates tons of offense from the blue line. The guy is a top 3 talent and yet we got him at 7, and we hope he can continue to develop and be another cornerstone on the blueline already filled with young talent.”