Geoff Snider is booked on a flight to New York this morning in anticipation of being among the first selections in tonight’s National Lacrosse League entry draft at Madison Square Garden.
“I’m a little nervous, a little unsure. Hopefully, it’ll pan out,” Snider said Tuesday. “It’ll be an honor to enter the league.”
The 2006 University of Denver graduate honed his skills in the box/indoor style of the NLL while winning three Minto Cups for the Lakers of Burnaby, British Columbia. In the field game, his faceoff domination helped Canada upset the United States at the world championships in July, and in August he helped the Denver Outlaws reach the Major League Lacrosse title game.
The defending NLL champion Colorado Mammoth owns the 13th and final pick in the first round of the six-round draft, which includes expansion teams from New York and Chicago.
“We have a couple offers out there to move up,” Mammoth general manager Steve Govett said by phone from New York. “If they come through, great. If not, we’re not worried about it.”
This draft is not nearly as talent-laden as the 2005 draft.
“Last year you could go 10- deep and it was a tossup, with the exception of Brodie Merrill,” Govett said of the Portland star, the NLL defender of the year as a rookie. “We got Dan Carey at No. 7, and Dan Carey could be No. 1 in this draft.”
San Jose owns the first two picks via a July 17 trade with the Chicago Shamrox and a four- player trade with New York announced Tuesday.
Four teams control the first eight selections with Buffalo at No. 3; Philadelphia at Nos. 4, 5 and 8; and Arizona at Nos. 6 and 7.
Talent and fitting a team’s needs are not always the deciding factors of draft order because of the part-time nature of a league in which most players work regular weekday jobs and many commute to home games.
Snider, for example, is unlikely to be picked by a team that does not allow fly-in players, because he plans to stay in Denver and pursue his new career with a software company.
Another challenge among NLL general managers is determining which American players will adapt successfully from the field game of the NCAA and the MLL to the box game of the NLL.
Brett Bucktooth (Syracuse), Jack Reid (Massachusetts) and Kyle Dixon (Virginia) fall into that category. Canadian box veterans Kyle Wailes, Gary Bining and Ryan Benesch and goalkeeper Paul Dawson, the brother of Arizona standout Dan Dawson, are easier to evaluate.
Adam Goodwin, a 26-goal scorer for DU last spring, also might be selected.
