The
Toronto Maple Leafs have selected defenceman Ethan MacKenzie with the 69th pick of the 2026 NHL Draft.
MacKenzie, 19, is in his third year of draft eligibility, making him slightly older than most players in this draft class, but there’s enough talent to his game to understand why the Maple Leafs took the gamble.
As Ellis mentioned, MacKenzie’s massive step forward this season earned him a spot on Canada’s World Junior team. He scored 22 goals in 59 games en route to a 58-point season with the Western Hockey League’s Edmonton Oil Kings in 2025-26. He finished the World Juniors with a goal and five points in seven games, and he was also a teammate of fellow Maple Leafs prospect Miroslav Holinka, who himself took massive steps forward in 2025-26.
Standing at 6-foot-1, weighing in at 187 pounds and possessing a left-handed shot, MacKenzie has good size and will join a relatively weak pool of left-handed defensive prospects in the Maple Leafs’ system. They addressed this a few picks earlier with the selection of Alexander Bilecki at 60th overall, a similarly-sized left-handed blueliner who plays for the Memorial Cup-winning Kitchener Rangers of the OHL.
MacKenzie is one of many Canadian junior hockey prospects who will be taking their talents south of the border to play in the NCAA next season. He is committed to the University of North Dakota, where he will be a teammate and potential defensive partner of Keaton Verhoeff, who was drafted tenth overall by the San Jose Sharks on Friday night.
He spoke to the
Edmonton Journal about his motivation to find his way onto an NHL team having already gone through two drafts without being selected.
“I’m kind of looking at it (draft) differently now that I’ve been at the combine which means there’s a pretty good possibility of going in the draft,” MacKenzie said. “My first year I had no chance. The second, I thought I had a decent chance but didn’t get my name called. This time, doesn’t matter to me where I go as long as I go, where my mindset is making my way onto a (NHL) team somehow. I won’t stop until I do.
The Maple Leafs have more draft capital than anticipated after trading Brandon Carlo to the St. Louis Blues for two third-round picks, which they used to select Zach Olsen and Mans Gudmundson.
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