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2012 NHL Mock Draft: Die By The Blade Selects Cody Ceci With the 12th Pick

The SB Nation NHL sites have all gotten together and come up with our own mock draft of the 1st round. Before we get into our selection, here are the 11 selections before us:

Pick Team Player
1 Edmonton – Copper And Blue Nail Yakupov
2 Columbus – The Cannon Filip Forsberg
3 Montreal – Habs Eyes on the Prize Mikhail Grigorenko
4 NY Islanders – Lighthouse Hockey Alex Galchenyuk
5 Toronto – Pension Plan Puppets Ryan Murray
6 Anaheim – Battle of California Matthew Dumba
7 Minnesota – Hockey Wilderness Jacob Trouba
8 Carolina – Canes Country Teuvo Tervainen
9 Winnipeg – Arctic Ice Hockey Radek Faksa
10 Tampa Bay – Raw Charge Griffin Reinhart
11 Washington – Japers’ Rink Zegmus Girgensons

With the 12th overall selection, we here at Die By The Blade have the pleasure of selecting Cody Ceci from the Ottawa 67’s. I can see the comments now on why I selected a defenseman for a team that is thin at forward and center in particular, but follow the jump for the explanation

Cody Ceci – D – Ottawa (OHL) – 6’1″ – 205 lbs

Ceci was an offensive star for the Ottawa 67’s scoring 17 goals and 60 points on the defense for the 67’s. Those totals led all defenders on the team by a wide margin, the next closest being Jake Cardwell with 36 points, and was second in the league in total points behind Dougie Hamilton. Hamilton was taken 9th by the Boston Bruins last season.

At 19, Ceci blossomed on a good final season with 67’s. The 17 goals and 60 points were both career highs in his three years in Ottawa. The next best season that Ceci had was last year with 9 goals and 34 points. His point total might be slightly inflated with Tyler Toffoli scoring 100 points and Shane Prince scoring 90 points as well.

Having the Sabres select a defenseman at 12 seems somewhat ridiculous considering the depth that the team has at the current position. The major problem though was that all of the good centers that could be considered Top 10 were already taken off the board by the time we were ready to pick at 12. It also didn’t make much sense to reach for a player that could be available again with the 21st overall pick.

Of course, this mock draft is predicated on the fact that the Sabres will make their picks at 12 and 21 and not try to move up in the draft. The feasibility of that happening is something that we will touch on later in the week. For now, let us know whether we made the right pick for the team.

Was Codi Ceci the right pick at 12th overall for the Sabres?

Yes 74
No 125