What if the Blackhawks made a different first-round pick in 2005?

If you listen to legendary Chicago Blackhawks announcer Pat Foley, you'll hear that Dale Tallon is the biggest architect of the Stanley Cup era. While he was a major contributor to the success of that era, he didn’t do it all by himself.

His predecessor, Mike Smith, drafted Duncan Keith, Brent Seabrook, Corey Crawford, Dustin Byfuglien, Dave Bolland, Bryan Bickell, and Troy Brower, giving Tallon quite the foundation to work with. And while we criticize Stan Bowman for how his tenure ended, he made some savvy moves to add to the team he inherited. He brought in guys like Michal Handzus, Johnny Oduya, Brad Richards, Scott Darling, and Antoine Vermette, who all played big roles during the championship runs.

Tallon drafted Jonathan Toews and Patrick Kane in back-to-back years, which gave him a lot of his glory. However, drafting was not his strong suit. Case in point, outside of Toews and Kane, the 14 other players he selected in the 2006 and 2007 drafts combined for 12 NHL games. You can live with that when you land a pair of Hall of Famers at the top of those classes.

While he hit home runs with Toews and Kane, Tallon had plenty of swings and misses. His first draft, in 2005, was one of them. He had the seventh overall pick, which he used to select Jack Skille from the USNTDP. Four picks later, the Los Angeles Kings altered their franchise by selecting Slovenian center Anze Kopitar. What if the Blackhawks had taken Kopitar over Skille?

Two Hall of Famers Down the Middle

Skille ended up playing 368 NHL games, but was never worth the seventh overall pick. His offense never translated to the NHL, with only 43 goals and 84 points. He performed well in his three AHL seasons with the Rockford IceHogs, scoring 59 goals and 128 points in 180 games. But he only played 79 games for the Blackhawks over parts of four seasons. His best year was 2010-11, when he scored seven goals and 17 points in 49 games before being dealt to the Florida Panthers. Bowman was able to get Michael Frolik back in the trade, who played a key role in the 2013 Stanley Cup victory.

Could you imagine if Tallon drafted Kopitar instead of Skille? The Blackhawks could have had quite the one-two punch down the middle with a pair of Hall of Famers. Now, you might be thinking, if Kopitar was the pick in 2005, would that have affected the 2006 and 2007 drafts? Kopitar didn’t make his NHL debut until 2006, so he wouldn't have had any bearing on the Toews pick.

He scored 20 goals and 61 points in his rookie season. Had he done that with the Blackhawks, he would have led the team in points and been tied for second in goals. The Blackhawks finished the season with the fifth-worst record, making them the last team eligible to win the first overall pick in the Draft Lottery. With Kopitar on the 2006-07 team, maybe they finish higher in the standings and don’t get the chance to draft Kane. Maybe not. Let’s just assume they stayed where they were in the standings and still won the lottery.

With Kopitar added to the Stanley Cup era teams, who knows how many more championships they could have won. With him and Toews as the top two centers, they would have been an even better defensive team. Bowman would have never had to go out and add Hanzus, Richards, or Vermette because his quest to find a second-line center would not have existed. There is a good chance they would have won three straight Cups because the Kings likely wouldn’t have reached the 2014 Western Conference Finals without Kopitar.

A Longer Competitive Window

Kopitar played his entire career in Los Angeles, scoring 452 goals and 1,316 points in 1,521 games. Would he have played all 20 of his NHL seasons with the Blackhawks if he were the pick in 2005? Probably not. If Kyle Davidson was willing to move on from Toews and Kane, Kopitar would have been a casualty of the rebuild too. But the course of the franchise would have been altered. With him in the mix, the Blackhawks would have held their championship window open longer. Case in point, in 2017-18, the first season the Blackhawks missed the playoffs, Kopitar was on fire. He had a career season with 35 goals and 92 points, which would have led the Blackhawks. Having him on that roster means they avoid their last-place finish and possibly contend to get back into the postseason.

The following season, Toews and Kane had career seasons, and Alex DeBrincat scored 41 goals, yet the Blackhawks still missed the playoffs. If Kopitar is in Chicago, maybe they don’t fire Joel Quenneville 15 games into the season and replace him with Jeremy Colliton, who turned out to be a disastrous hire.

Who knows how all these scenarios would have played out, but it’s fun to imagine how much better the greatest era of Blackhawks hockey could have been with just one different draft pick.

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