Penguins pick winger Samuel Poulin with 1st-round draft choice

VANCOUVER, British Columbia — Pittsburgh Penguins general manager Jim Rutherford did a few things at the NHL Draft on Friday night in Vancouver that he hasn’t done in a while.

First, he actually used a first-round draft choice for the first time since 2014, spurning trade offers and taking power forward Samuel Poulin with the 21st overall selection.

Then, for the first time this offseason, he threw cold water on the idea his planned roster retooling might include a trade of a high-profile, tenured star such as Kris Letang or Evgeni Malkin.

“I’m prepared to say it’s highly unlikely,” Rutherford said.

“The point I was making is I’m open to accepting calls and have conversations about our players. I wasn’t actively trying to move those top guys.”

In general, Rutherford downplayed the scope of the changes he has planned after a humbling first-round playoff exit last season.

It’s common knowledge he would have sent Phil Kessel to Minnesota for Jason Zucker earlier this month if the 31-year-old winger hadn’t used his modified no-trade clause to veto the deal.

Beyond that, expectations of fireworks were misguided, Rutherford said.

“Now we’ll just see where things go,” Rutherford said. “Certainly based on assumption or what people are thinking, that there’s going to be a lot of turnover with the Penguins, I don’t think there was ever that intention. We wanted to make some changes, change a little bit of the culture in the room. We started to do that. We’ll probably do it prior to training camp.”

A change in attitude might be more important than a change in personnel, Rutherford said.

“I think we could go about our business with a little different approach as to how we bring the team together,” Rutherford said. “If we can make two or three moves here over the summer — we’ve already made one — and then regroup and get the team in the right direction where they come together, we have good players. They’re good enough players to win. We could never bring the team together last year. If I’d have made a lot of changes, it’s going to take a while for the team to come together.”

League wide, only one trade was completed Friday night, and it was a swap of draft picks between Philadelphia and Arizona.

The NHL is expected to announce the salary cap number for next season Saturday, and it’s likely to be lower than originally thought, no higher than $82 million. That led to speculation that teams were hesitant to make deals because they had less cap space than expected.

Rutherford said the Penguins won’t have any such problems.

“We’re not going to be under any pressure from a cap point of view,” Rutherford said. “When we made the Olli Maatta deal, it took the pressure off.”

He also said he didn’t think the lack of cap space had a chilling effect Friday night.

“Still got a ways to go, but the draft is so strong,” Rutherford said. “I don’t think people wanted to move their picks.”

Poulin, a 6-foot-1, 206-pound right-handed shooter, had 29 goals and 76 points in 67 games last season. He was the youngest captain in the QMJHL.

The son of longtime NHL forward Patrick Poulin, he’s known as a modern-day power forward, showing a degree of physicality and exceptional smarts. Scouts say he’s a safe pick with a high floor and low offensive ceiling.

He is the Penguins’ first first-round pick since they took Kasperi Kapanen 22nd overall in 2014.

“He has a good skill level. He’s got great character, too,” Rutherford said. “He was a guy that we liked a lot.”