Wild Can Still Have Draft Success Without 1st- or 2nd-Round Picks

It’s been 10 days since the Carolina Hurricanes won the Stanley Cup over the Vegas Golden Knights, and the NHL has had barely any quiet time since then. The 2026 NHL Entry Draft will take place this weekend on Friday, June 26, and Saturday, June 27. With the draft so close, the trade market heated up as several bigger trades happened over the past few days that included Brady Tkachuk headed to the Florida Panthers, Jordan Kyrou to the Washington Capitals, and Bowen Byram to the Chicago Blackhawks.  

The Wild weren’t active in any trades just yet, and unlike the majority of NHL fans, Wild fans won’t be overly excited for the draft either. They don’t have any picks in the first or second round; their first pick is 89th overall in the third round. They then have one in the fourth, two in the fifth, and a final one in the sixth round. In this article, we’ll take a look at why the Wild don’t have a first or second round pick and what positions they should focus on with their remaining picks. 

Wild Picked Up Hughes

Many know the reason the Wild don’t have a first-round pick in this year’s draft because they used it as part of the trade to bring in Quinn Hughes. At the time, the draft pick wasn’t a major concern as they also traded Marco Rossi, Zeev Buium, and Liam Öhgren, all players on the roster at the time. Now that the draft is upon us, everyone wondered why the Wild didn’t have a pick in the first round, and then remembered why. 

While it’ll be difficult to watch all the prime young talent be selected, having Hughes on the roster has proven to be worth it. Within a game or two of his being with the Wild, he transformed the team and the fanbase. The Wild have always had a strong fanbase, but he gave them the hope they’d longed for and gave the team a boost as well. 

Hughes was a critical piece of the Wild’s roster and helped them get past the first round of the postseason for the first time in 11 years. He was fourth among Wild players in points for the regular season, but he jumped to tied for first with Kirill Kaprizov during the postseason; they both had 15 points in 11 games played. Although the postseason didn’t end the way they wanted, it’s hard to argue with the Hughes trade, and it could be just the beginning as long as Hughes re-signs in Minnesota. 

Wild’s Unfortuante Second Round Loss

Losing out on the first round pick is hard to take, but the reason they lost the second round pick is a bit more difficult. The Wild traded their second-round pick in this season’s draft to the Nashville Predators for Gustav Nyquist on March 1, 2025. Again, at the time, it likely didn’t seem like a lot, but it ended up not working out for them. 

Nyquist had a few points with the Wild, but not what everyone hoped for, and then in the postseason, he really struggled. There is one particular play that will likely stick with Wild fans for a long time, and that was in the 2025 postseason against the Golden Knights in Game 5, when a goal was called back because he was offside. It was quite obvious, and he didn’t try to straddle the line either, which caused some anger.

Wild’s Positional Needs 

The majority of the players who make it to the NHL are first and second round picks, of course there are players from every round of a draft, but the probability goes down the further into the draft you get. It’s also harder to pick which players a team would go for. However, some teams need a specific position and will look for it the deeper into the draft they go. 

The Wild are a team who needs a first-line center but obviously they aren’t going to get that in the third round of the draft, it would be hard to get that even in the first round. However, they can still look at centers for their future as well as wings and even goaltenders. They could use almost any position when picking that low, as it’s a player who won’t make it up to the NHL for at least a season, if not more. 

This is when a team can find a young player with potential and have time to fine-tune that potential. The Wild don’t have a specific area they need to build on, but they could get someone in each position to cover all areas because none of these players are going to be ready to go immediately. 

The Wild can still make use of these picks to build for the future, even if they’re not going to play right now. Hopefully the can make some solid picks and have a great future over the next few seasons as well.