Will an NHL team draft 7-foot-1 monster Alexander Karmanov?

With the NHL Draft quickly approaching on June 26-27, much of the focus is on the top prospects across the board. Yet, the fringe prospects in the later rounds could feature some gems — one of which might be a towering defenseman, Alexander Karmanov

At seven-foot-one, Karamanov split the most recent season between the OHL’s North Bay Battalion and GOJHL’s Brantford Titans, in what was his second year in North America after leaving Russia and Belarus to join WB/Scranton Knights 16U AAA in 2024-26. 

On a recent episode of Daily Faceoff LIVE, Daily Faceoff associate editor and prospect analyst Steven Ellis joined co-hosts Tyler Yaremchuk and Carter Hutton to break down the blueliner’s potential. 

Tyler Yaremchuk: Before we let you go, I need to ask you about the seven-foot-one defenseman Alexander Karmanov. 

Steven Ellis: He’s massive, and he’s also from Moldova. He’s a very interesting story there. So, this was a guy that, when he committed to Penn State a few years ago, was kind of like, ‘okay, that’s cool, like we’ll never hear about him again.’ When I asked a couple of scouts who were the worst skater in the drafters, they said Alexander Karamanov, and on a scale of 1-10, I was given the number somewhere between 1.5 and two at the absolute max, — he is not a good skater, but he is seven-foot-one, 280 pounds. 

He is like the biggest human being I’ve ever seen in person, and he’s going to be the biggest player to ever get drafted to the NHL. I was told there’s basically 100% certainty he will be drafted this year. We’re talking about a late-round pick, but you have to kind of look at the fact that Zdeno Chara, when he was drafted, everyone looked at him, said, ‘This guy can’t skate, he’s too slow, he’s going to struggle.’I’d say Chara had a pretty good NHL career. I’m not saying Karamanov is going to have a good NHL career, but a team is going to say, ‘Yeah, we might as well just draft him and just hope something works out here.’ 

He played most of the year in the OHL. I actually thought he’d be very good against a junior B competition this year, so like under half a point per game, which is hard to do when you’re a guy that doesn’t really have quick hands, but take a chance on the biggest guy you’re ever going to see in person. He’s gonna, he’s gonna be scary.

You can catch the full segment and the rest of the show here…