2025 NHL Draft: Maple Leafs Select Frontenacs Forward Tyler Hopkins With 86th Pick In NHL Draft

The Toronto Maple Leafs have selected Kingston Frontenacs Tyler Hopkins with the 86th pick in the NHL draft.

Hopkins, a center with OHL Kingston, scored 20 goals and 51 points in 67 games this season, the seventh-most points on the team. NHL Central Scouting projected the 6-foot-1, 181-pound forward to go 52nd overall in the 2025 Draft.

"Obviously being from Campbellville, grew up a Leafs fan. I've been to plenty of games over the course of my childhood and even the recent years. I think just when that moment kind of happened, it was just pure excitement, obviously, to get drafted is every kid's dream," Hopkins said via Zoom on Saturday afternoon.

"And to be drafted by your hometown team is one level even better than that. I think that I kind of hit the jackpot with it, getting two birds with one stone, and it was just pure joy and excitement when I was able to hear my name called."

Hopkins played with Team Canada at the 2025 Under-18 World Junior Championships and won a gold medal. The 18-year-old tallied one assist in the tournament with Canada through six games, while also capturing gold at the Hlinka Gretzky Cup one year earlier.

"I'm a fast two-way forward that takes care of his defensive zone that can still create offense," Hopkins described himself in his 2025 draft profile via the OHL. "I think that if I can start to develop more of a scoring threat to myself and not so much as a passer, I think that that can propel me to that next level."

Hopkins is entering his third season with Kingston. In 126 games with the Frontenacs over two seasons, Hopkins put up 26 goals and 38 assists for 64 points.

"I think that something that I've tried to work on is my defensive game over the past two years. I think it's something that I've really kind of built a base on in my 16-year-old year and kind of still leading into this year by adding a little bit more of an offense," Hopkins said.

"I think at the next level, I'm that third-line center that is there, plays a 200-foot game, is able to move up and down a lineup and is relied on by the coaching staff."

Hopkins added that his favorite moment growing up as a Maple Leafs fan was seeing them eliminate the Tampa Bay Lightning in the first round of the playoffs in 2023.

"The excitement inside of the arena when they got out of that first round, and obviously looking to keep pushing farther into the Stanley Cup finals, I think that was probably the coolest moment that I've actually been able to be at the rink and kind of see firsthand."

When he arrives in Kingston for his third season of junior hockey, Hopkins wants to round out his offensive game and finish on opportunities when he gets them.

"I think I have the ability to contribute a little bit more to offensively to my team," said Hopkins. "So I think just kind of getting into the middle of the ice a little bit more, creating more scoring chances and then just working on finishing in those opportunities more consistently."

He added that he models his game around Lightning center Anthony Cirelli. It's been a whirlwind for Hopkins, who really hasn't had much of a break since his season in Kingston ended. The forward went straight to the Under-18 Worlds and then the draft combine before arriving in Los Angeles for the draft.

And being drafted by Toronto will be a moment he likely remembers forever.

"I think there's like a hundred or more texts probably now. There's a hundred when I just looked," he said with a smile. "So a lot of people reaching out to support. Obviously, I've had a lot of people through my life that have been really special to me and able to kind of help support me to get to this moment right now."