List of New Jersey Devils draft picks

The New Jersey Devils are a professional ice hockey team based in Newark, New Jersey. They are members of the Atlantic Division of the Eastern Conference of the National Hockey League (NHL). The club was founded in Kansas City, Missouri as the Kansas City Scouts in 1974, moved to Denver, Colorado as the Colorado Rockies after only two seasons, and then settled in New Jersey in 1982. Since arriving in New Jersey, the Devils have drafted 299 players.

The NHL Entry Draft is held each June, allowing teams to select players who have turned 18 years old by September 15 in the year the draft is held. The draft order is determined by the previous season's order of finish, with non-playoff teams drafting first, followed by the teams that made the playoffs, with the specific order determined by the number of points earned by each team.[1] The NHL holds a weighted lottery for the 14 non-playoff teams, allowing the winner to move up a maximum of four positions in the entry draft.[2] The team with the fewest points has the best chance of winning the lottery, with each successive team given a lower chance of moving up in the draft.[1] The Devils have never won the lottery.[3] Between 1986 and 1994, the NHL also held a Supplemental Draft for players in American colleges.[4]

New Jersey's first draft pick was Rocky Trottier, taken eighth overall in the 1982 NHL Entry Draft. The highest New Jersey has ever drafted is second overall, which they did twice; Kirk Muller (1984) and Brendan Shanahan (1987) were taken in the second spot. Ten picks went on to play over 1,000 NHL games: Shanahan, Pat Verbeek, Muller, Ken Daneyko, John MacLean, Bill Guerin, Scott Niedermayer, Eric Weinrich, Brian Rolston, Jason Smith, and Martin Brodeur. On the opposite end of the spectrum, three Devils draftees (Stanislav Gron, Mikko Jokela, and Joey Tenute) have just one NHL game to their credit.

By nationality, the Devils have drafted 145 Canadians, 81 Americans, 26 Russians, 13 Swedes, 11 Finns, 9 Czechs, 6 Slovaks, 3 Germans, 1 Briton, 1 Kazakh, 1 Latvian, 1 Pole, and 1 Australian. The Devils have drafted 12 players from the Oshawa Generals of the Ontario Hockey League, more than from any other team; the OHL also comprises the greatest number of draftees for the Devils, as 61 OHL players have been drafted. 191 forwards, 101 defensemen and 7 goaltenders have been drafted.

In the 2009 NHL Entry Draft, the Devils traded their first and third round picks to the Calgary Flames for Calgary's first round pick (20th overall), which they used to select Swedish center Jacob Josefson.[5] After using their second round pick on Canadian defenseman Eric Gelinas, they used a third round pick they had acquired in an earlier trade with Minnesota to take Alexander Urbom, a Swedish defenseman playing for Djurgardens IF.[6] Four of the Devils' seven draft picks in 2009 were on defensemen.[5]

Draft picks
''Statistics are complete as of the 2008–09 NHL season and show each player's career regular season totals in the NHL. Wins, losses, ties, overtime losses and goals against average apply to goaltenders and are used only for players at that position. This list includes players drafted by the team in New Jersey only.''