This weekend getaway was unlike any other for Justin Graf.
Graf calls Lake Winnipesaukee home on many weekends throughout the New England summer months, where time with his family and friends is the perfect getaway.
This particular Saturday was slightly less relaxing, however, as the vacation spot was transformed into an NHL Draft watch party.
Cornhole and Kan Jam by the water were no longer leisure activities but a distraction from what was taking place some 450-plus miles west at the KeyBank Center in Buffalo, N.Y.
And when the Lincoln, Mass., native was selected with the 118th overall pick in the fourth round by the Nashville Predators, his weekend plans quickly changed. No longer would Graf spend the night in New Hampshire with his friends. He had a plane to catch.
This would have ordinarily been disappointing news for Graf on a given Saturday night in the summertime.
“In most cases, yes,” Graf said. “In this case, no.”
What happened next was somewhat of a blur. Juggling congratulatory phone calls and texts with preparing for his flight, Graf eventually arrived in Nashville on Sunday ahead of development camp in what was a stressful yet exciting 24 hours.
“It was surreal,” Graf said. “I just saw it on the TV, and I was just so excited. All my friends were going crazy.”
The 6-foot-1, 174-pound forward is a Harvard commit and will play under first-year head coach Rob Rassey this upcoming season after a successful stint in the USHL with the Cedar Rapids RoughRiders, where he racked up 23-32-55 in 52 games.
Graf, in his second year of draft eligibility, thought there was a range of roughly four rounds in which his name could be called after going undrafted in his initial draft year out of prep at Rivers. NHL Central Scouting placed Graf as a fifth-round target in its final rankings ahead of the draft.
But as Graf has learned all too well, rankings often have little to no impact on any player’s given future.
He was quickly reminded of that when his brother, Collin, called him minutes after he was plucked by the Predators. Justin quickly quipped to his older brother that he had accomplished something Collin hadn’t in getting drafted.
“He got me there for sure,” Collin said, laughing. “Now he can say when we were both 18, he was better than I was. I’ll give him that for sure.”
Collin, who also attended Predators development camp in 2023 before his steady rise to an everyday NHL forward with the San Jose Sharks, was undrafted before he inked a contract with the Sharks in April of 2024 after a two-year stint at Quinnipiac. The 2024 ECAC Player of the Year also had a pivotal hand in delivering the Bobcats’ first-ever national championship in 2023.
This past year with San Jose, he amassed 21-25-46 in 81 games and was one of the many bright spots on a Sharks team riddled with rising talent.
Justin said watching his older brother prove naysayers wrong at each level was extra motivation to stay committed to his path.
“I wanted to be like him, and I wanted to be better than him,” Justin said. “So I always had that motivation to do what he’s done.”
When Justin went undrafted last year after a standout season at Rivers — netting 55 points in 28 games — he didn’t get frustrated. It’s a growing reality that NHL teams are increasingly wary when selecting players out of prep. Just four prep players were chosen in this year’s draft — a slight increase from two last year and just one in 2024 — as it is becoming more appealing for prospects to test the waters in juniors.
This turned out to be the case for Justin.
“I think I told him this year when it was looking like he was going to get picked, but he didn’t really know where he was going to get picked, to go look at the guys in that 2021 draft where my draft was, and a lot of people don’t make it from a lot of positions in the draft,” Collin said. “Just because they are viewed as better than you right now doesn’t mean that they are always going to be better than you.”
Justin fit right into the USHL this season, recording over a point per game until a nagging wrist injury required surgery in late March.
“He’s a pretty well-rounded player,” said Cedar Rapids president, general manager and head coach Mark Carlson. “He’s got good hockey sense, he’s got some poise and he makes plays; he sees the ice and he shows the ability to score. He’s going to pack some muscle on his body and get bigger and stronger. There’s an awful lot to like.”
Carlson said Justin can be an impactful college player this season and never doubted his chances of getting drafted throughout his successful season in Cedar Rapids. Justin was one of four RoughRiders who were drafted this year.
Justin expected the speed and physicality of the USHL game to be on a different level compared to prep. Last offseason, he focused on getting stronger while maintaining his quickness.
While prep players are beginning to receive fewer NHL opportunities in their draft year, that’s not to say the level of competition isn’t preparing them for juniors. Rivers was loaded with talent during Justin’s final season in 2024-25, including future U.S. National Team Development Program standouts in Boston University commits Carter Meyer (Winchester, Mass.) and Sam Pandolfo (Winchester, Mass.), and the Boston College-bound Finn Sears (Medford, Mass.).
“I think it prepared me really well,” Justin said. “Playing for Freddy (Meyer) was great, and I think he always has had a huge focus on development, especially in our practices and getting better every day. And obviously, there’s some good players there. So I got to play against good players every day in practice, which helped me get better.”
It was only a matter of time, then, until the NHL came calling. But if you ask Collin, he sees the same younger brother with a lethal wrist shot and a drive to be just like him.
“It’s funny, I think some of the things he is good at now he was good at when he was six years old,” Collin said. “Something that I believe in and he believes in too is that you want to keep not only working to round out your game, but you want to work on your strengths and really try to make your strengths as good as they can be because that’s what makes you, you.”
