- Detroit traded goalie Sebastian Cossa to Utah for the 23rd pick and used it on J.P. Hurlbert
- The Texas-born winger grew up a Red Wings fan with a Michigan Dylan Larkin jersey hanging at home
- Read below for Hurlbert on the Yzerman phone call and the loaded Michigan team he joins this fall
J.P. Hurlbert’s first hockey jersey was a Detroit Red Wings sweater with no name on the back. He was a kid in Allen, Texas at the time, roughly 1,200 miles from Detroit.
Twenty-three picks into the 2026 draft, that jersey turned into a job.
The 18-year-old walked through the summer since with Marco D’Amico of RG, and he still sounds like he is waiting for somebody to correct the record:
“It honestly feels like a dream. Sometimes I’ve got to catch myself. I can still see my first time walking into the Red Wings locker room. I was just astonished. I’m living my childhood dream.”
Detroit did not own a first-rounder walking into the night in Buffalo. The Red Wings shipped goalie Sebastian Cossa to Utah for the 23rd pick, and the second the board flipped over to Detroit, Hurlbert felt something.
He explained what went through his head as the clock started:
“When I saw they were on the clock, I just kind of had a feeling in the moment. I think it was just the perfect fit.”
That fit was not an accident. Hurlbert’s dad raised him on the Red Wings in Texas, and family trips to NHL games meant Stars games against Detroit. A Steve Yzerman jersey hangs upstairs at the house, and a Michigan Dylan Larkin jersey hangs near it, which reads a little differently now that Hurlbert is the one heading to Ann Arbor.
Then the name on the jersey upstairs rang his phone.
“I think the first thing is Steve Yzerman called me. That’s pretty cool, obviously, as the GM at the time, but also an NHL legend.”
Nicklas Lidstrom and Kris Draper reached out too. Moritz Seider and Alex DeBrincat sent messages. Hurlbert went from the draft floor to development camp, roomed with fellow first-rounder Carter Bear, and met Niklas Kronwall.
Michigan is the next stop, and it is not a soft landing. Michael Hage is back, projected 2027 first overall pick Landon DuPont arrives with the freshman class, and Max Pacioretty is on Brandon Naurato’s staff. Hurlbert did not hedge on his new head coach.
“I especially look forward to learning from coach Nar, I think he’s the best in the world at player development.”
The scoring travels with him. Hurlbert put up 42 goals and 97 points in 68 games as a WHL rookie with Kamloops last season, enough to win the Jim Piggott Memorial Trophy as the league’s rookie of the year and land on the Conference First All-Star Team.
Ann Arbor sits about 45 minutes down I-94 from Little Caesars Arena, which puts Hurlbert’s freshman year a short drive from the building he grew up watching on TV in Texas.
