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Dubas Reveals Why Ben Kindel Was the Penguins' Top Choice at No. 11
Photo credit: Edit from The New York Times
Pittsburgh Penguins GM Kyle Dubas shocked the hockey world when he drafted Ben Kindel with the 11th overall pick, and he clarified his reasoning behind it.
The Pittsburgh Penguins tried to move up in the 2025 NHL Draft, but no other teams ahead of them were willing to trade out of the first round.
Hockey operations president and general manager Kyle Dubas confirmed reports that advancing up would have required both of the Penguins' first-round picks. Dubas switched gears and traded three first-round picks instead.
Some scouts had Kindel going as late as the second round
At No. 11 overall, the Penguins made a slight stretch by selecting forward Ben Kindel, a smallish player (5-foot-10, 176 pounds) who many thought would be picked later in the round or even into the second round.
However, the team clearly had him high on their board. The top four centers were all off the board by No. 10, Dubas indicated, with Anaheim picking Roger McQueen one selection ahead of Pittsburgh's pick.
In a matter of moments, Dubas made a trade down with Philadelphia for the 12th overall pick in exchange for No. 22 and No. 31.
He then used the second-round pick (which Washington had sent to him in the Anthony Beauvillier deal) to trade up again and acquire the 24th overall pick.
Kindel's selection may have caused some raised eyebrows, but Penguins VP of player personnel Wes Clark, a scout in his own right with a strong resume during his time with Toronto (e.g., Matthew Knies, Fraser Minten), was supposedly one of the top voices behind choosing Kindel.
"I think right from the beginning of the year, he was a player that our area scouts and then Wes had really keyed in on as someone that they had a lot of belief in. So I had watched him play, and he just continued to get better and better," said Dubas. "We understand he's not the biggest guy, but you look at the production and you look at the intelligence and his skill set. What we came to in the last couple of days as we met here was if we passed on him, we had intel that he wasn't going to go much further beyond 11, we just didn't want to look back on and say, 'geez, why did we pass on this guy that had 99 points and then stepped up his game in the playoffs?'"
Now, under Pittsburgh's direction of the draft, Clark's vision is clearly having a lasting impact on the team's future. Overall, Dubas' aggressive strategy netted three good prospects and signaled a new era of aggression to a prospect-deprived franchise.
| POLL | ||
JUIN 28 | 126 ANSWERS Dubas Reveals Why Ben Kindel Was the Penguins' Top Choice at No. 11 Was Ben Kindel the right choice for the 11th overall pick? | ||
| Yes | 73 | 57.9 % |
| No | 53 | 42.1 % |
| List of polls | ||