Jackson Smith
2025 NHL Draft Eligible
Position: D, Shoots: L
H/W: 6-foot-3, 190 pounds
Date of Birth: 2007-05-13
There's no debate whatsoever about who the best defenseman available in the 2025 NHL draft is, with Matthew Schaefer being the runaway consensus favourite. And while we're not quite all the way there yet, budding Tri-City Americans superstar Jackson Smith is playing so well and improving so rapidly that there might not be any question come June who the second blueliner to get picked will be either.
It's impossible to miss Smith on most of his shifts, because he's a remarkably explosive player. His rangy frame flies around the ice at jersey-flapping speeds, he routinely attempts electrifying plays with the puck, and he loves to throw his body around with big hits. At the same time, however, he also has a bad habit of making costly turnovers at inopportune times that lead directly to scoring chances for opposing teams, which are impossible to miss for all the wrong reasons. But Rome wasn't built in a day, and Smith is the type of player where it’s worth putting up with those low moments, because his highs are just so high and there are so many more of them.
His Tri-City team is in a bit of an awkward position as an organization, where they’re neither one of the top contenders in the WHL nor one of the bottom feeders. In a weird way that’s kind of perfect for his individual development, because he’s playing in meaningful games for a team that will make the playoffs, but the Americans are still thin enough on the back end that he can play a lot of minutes in all situations while also getting his coach’s blessing to be creative and try playing a bit of hero puck. For a prospect like Smith, who has amazing tools but still has a lot to learn about how to use them, those are ideal circumstances, and you can already see how and where his game is growing in response.
If Smith keeps developing at his current rate between now and the end of his season then he’s going to be a hot commodity when the draft rolls around in June, so much so that he might even find himself getting selected within the first five picks.
Skating
Smith's skating is enthralling to watch, and it is easily his single best attribute. He has it all: power, balance, stride length, edge work, crossovers, pivots and so on. He can reach his top speed almost immediately, he can be highly evasive under pressure, and he's aggressively sticky in man-on-man defensive situations. As if all that wasn't enough, he's also an exceptionally well-conditioned athlete, which allows him to blast all over the ice all game long without running out of gas. If Smith isn't the single best skater in the entire 2025 draft class, he's certainly right near the top.
This isn’t an especially exciting clip, but that’s because Smith makes it all look so easy and effortless. He quickly gains speed coming up the ice and easily gets around the first layer of defence prior to the zone entry. Crucially, he lets his built-up momentum take him toward the opposing net, which further spreads out the penalty killers and leads to a scoring chance. Despite being simple and straightforward, plays like this are an effective way to open up space, and they will remain a big part of his game at all levels.
This is a similar clip to the one above it, but make note of how badly the penalty killers fall back and allow the zone entry. That’s because they play in the same division as Tri-City and know what Smith is capable of. They either have to respect Smith’s speed and let him back them up to a degree, or they keep a tighter gap and run the risk of him getting behind them and leaving them in the dust, which we’ll see in other clips further down this article.
Smith loves to activate from the offensive blueline, and for good reason. He covers so much ice with just a few pushes, and he can fluidly move in all directions to maintain space for himself with the puck. He also understands the importance of motion when it comes to opening up defensive structures, which is exhibited in this clip when he switches spots with a teammate along the blueline and then switches back.
Great lateral movement by Smith here, using a quick 10-and-2 to cut into the middle for a better look at the net.
Here’s an example of how Smith can use his sharp edges to escape pressure. He’s usually pretty smooth and coordinated when it comes to spinning off forecheckers, and if he sees the opportunity in front of him, he’s not shy about accelerating and carrying the puck out of the zone himself.
Grade: 62.5
Shot
From a technical standpoint, Smith's shot isn't especially dangerous right now, and that's reflected by his low goal total on the season. However, there are reasons to expect that supplementary goal-scoring will be a normal part of his game going forward. With his fantastic skating ability and willingness to jump up in the play he finds himself a lot of great looks at the net, and with enough reps he should eventually figure out how to bury more of them. His shot will also get more power behind it moving forward as he continues to add muscle to his slight frame.
Here’s a perfect example of how Smith’s skating ability also makes him a scoring threat. Most defensemen his age wouldn’t be able to get that kind of separation and single-handedly create a shooting opportunity that close to the enemy net.
This clip is similar to the one above it, but this time Smith goes through the opposing defenders instead of around them once he turns on the jets. And again, that’s a dangerous look at the goalie, which he conjures up out of nothing in a matter of seconds.
The goalie in this clip would like to have this one back but give Smith credit nevertheless for the poise that he displays and the little shimmy to open up more daylight for himself before firing.
When Smith isn’t making himself a shooting threat in transition by transporting the puck himself he is always ready to jump in instead as a trailer, which can be just as effective. In this clip he recognizes immediately that his team has numbers going back up the ice and springs into action. The shot itself is fairly weak and should have been stopped, but sometimes a shooter gets lucky when the goalie is moving laterally.
This is a nice representation of what most of Smith’s shots from the blueline look like. Sure, there’s a good effort to walk the line first, but the shot itself is weak and goes right into the netminder’s breadbasket. At this point in time, he doesn’t project as someone who will be much of a scoring threat from distance, but as mentioned above, that could still change after he is more physically developed.
Grade: 50
Skills
Things can sometimes get a little chaotic when Smith is controlling the puck, but it will still be best if he keeps being a primary play-driver and trying different things out, because he's already capable of making high-end plays that most of his peers cannot. While his hands aren't always the smoothest, with his long reach and preference to play at a blistering pace he can nevertheless make opponents look foolish and put them out of position with some quick stickhandling or wide, sweeping dekes. Smith also displays legitimately great vision as a playmaker, frequently making dangerous passes to his teammates, usually through seams that he opens up himself.
Nobody will ever accuse Smith of not being entertaining to watch! The spin move to maintain possession of the puck was a little fluky, but the swing wide and curl back to draw in pressure before passing it off to an open teammate was completely calculated.
This is an absolutely gorgeous assist. It looks like a set play off the faceoff and Smith executes his part in it perfectly, sending his pass tape to tape without any hesitation. The Seattle players had no idea what just hit them.
Here is some great work of his on the powerplay. He whips those passes through the open lanes, and the second of the two could have easily been a goal if his teammate was in a slightly better position.
Here’s another great pass from him that came awfully close to becoming an assist. That’s an excellent job by him to find a lane that gets the puck through three defenders, and he even sends the pass across his body to do it.
Sometimes Smith can be a little too loose handling the puck, as seen here. He has plenty of time and space to make a safe play, at minimum, so there’s just no excuse to turn it over as easily as he does.
This is another play that simply shouldn’t end as a bad turnover. He doesn’t appear to have good control of the puck after receiving the pass yet still tries to beat his check one-on-one anyways. Maybe a different player, one with truly elite hands, could have kept possession there, but Smith isn’t at that level and should have picked a different option.
Grade: 55
Smarts
This is a difficult part of Smith’s game to confidently assess, because examples can swing wildly from fantastic to terrible, sometimes even within the same shift. Generally speaking, he thinks and understands the game better without the puck than with it. He has some legitimately advanced know-how when it comes to his gap control, defensive structuring and rotations, how to get body positioning on opponents or tie them up cleanly, and so on. On the flip side, most of his problems stem from when the puck is on his stick, and these pop up occasionally in all three zones across a variety of situations. It does need to be mentioned, though, that he carries the puck more than anyone else on his team at just 17 years of age, and that he has made significant improvements in this area over the past year and a half, so things are looking up. The key for him long-term will be to ensure that the good moments keep outweighing the bad ones.
Here’s a great example of Smith’s smarts defensively. That’s a professional-level stick lift, stealing the puck quickly and smoothly without taking a penalty.
This is superb situational awareness from Smith. He notices the positioning of the players in front of him, both friends and foes, and accurately recognizes that he can be sprung for a scoring chance if his winger makes the same read of the play as him. That’s precisely what happens, and the give-and-go leads to an odd-man rush and then a goal.
All players make mistakes, but Smith is prone to some real stinkers. This particular one would be hard to top, though. There’s just no good reason for him to make that spin move in front of his own open net, and the time spent looking backwards causes him to miss how close the oncoming forechecker was.
In this clip Smith carries the puck straight ahead into heavy traffic and coughs it up, which was an entirely avoidable mistake. It’s great that he plays with confidence and it’s best if he stays that way, but he’ll need to become a lot more careful about where and when he takes risks.
One more turnover example here that leads to a goal against his team, this one coming from an attempted pass. He’s on the powerplay again, he’s behind his own goal line and his team is comfortably in the lead, so there’s no need for him to try forcing this pass with a penalty killer right in front of him. It’s the sort of error that a prospect of his caliber should know how to avoid by this point in their development, so if it happens too frequently in the coming months it might give some NHL scouts pause.
Grade: 50
Physicality/Compete
Nobody would ever accuse Smith of being a goon, and he's not the type of defenseman to be obsessed with chasing body checks. That being said, what he lacks in quantity of hits he makes up for with the quality of them. With his sublime agility he's able to quickly line up his targets and then put some momentum behind his attacks. And like previously mentioned with his shot, it's clear that he's going to get a lot stronger than he currently is as he continues to add muscle mass and grow further into his frame. As for the compete part of his game, he gets full marks. He exhibits a high amount of desire to be a difference-maker and someone who leaves his mark. He knows that he has the necessary tools to single-handedly take over shifts, and he clearly has the passion to be that kind of player.
This play starts with Smith committing a turnover but watch how hard he works to correct his mistake and get back defensively, including making the decisive stick check that gets possession back for his team. His coaches will be more forgiving of his mistakes up the ice so long as he applies this much effort recovering into position.
Smith can be a real menace sometimes with his man-on-man defending. And in this clip not only does he hound his check to the point that the zone is cleared, he also keeps going and almost wins the puck back from a different opponent.
One of the most important elements of throwing a big hit is being able to line up your target. Watch how good of a job Smith does here, using his crossovers to go right and then abruptly back left to keep the Everett forward in front of him before picking the right time to lower his shoulder.
This is a real hitter’s hit, knowing that the opposing player is going to be coming around the net toward him with nowhere to escape to, and Smith braces himself beautifully so that he can make maximum impact.
In this clip he could have (and maybe should have) gone for a poke check instead of the hit, but you can tell that he was seeking it out, possibly to keep his team energized while they’re trailing by a goal late in the game. There are some situations in hockey where you want your defenders to get a little nasty, so it’s always a perk when one of them has that kind of fire in their belly.
Grade: 57.5
OFP: 55.625
A note on the 20-80 scale used above. We look at five attributes (skating, shooting, puck skills, hockey IQ and physicality) for skaters and six for goalies (athleticism/quickness, compete/temperament, vision/play reading, technique/style, rebound control and puck handling). Each individual attribute is graded along the 20-80 scales, which includes half-grades. The idea is that a projection of 50 in a given attribute meant that our observer believed that the player could get to roughly NHL average at that attribute at maturity.