Elite talent is the one ingredient that all the cap space in the world won’t buy for the Rangers, whose past practice of trading draft choices in their chase for an elusive Stanley Cup has left the organization all but bereft of high-end, difference-making skill.
But the Blueshirts, who probably didn’t go for the highest-ceiling teenager available in this weekend’s draft with their seventh-overall selection of well-rounded and mature center Lias Andersson, do have a potential world-class prospect working his way toward the NHL.
And perhaps sooner rather than later.
His name is Sean Day, and if the tag “exceptional” might prove hyperbolic at this moment, remember that this 19-year-old potential stud defenseman was only the fourth player in OHL history to be granted “exceptional player status” that allowed him to join the league as a 15-year-old in 2013.