Oilers to choose Hall or Seguin in NHL draft

Hockey fans in Edmonton have one more week to wait before the "Taylor or Tyler" saga comes to an end.

The Edmonton Oilers have the first overall pick in the 2010 entry NHL draft in Los Angeles on June 25. They will choose either Taylor Hall or Tyler Seguin.

The first pick is being hyped as a critical pick for the team — one that could help the team start to climb out of the league basement.

Hall, of the OHL's Windsor Spitfires, the back-to-back Memorial Cup champions, visited fans in Edmonton last week.

Seguin, a forward with the OHL's Plymouth Whalers, is the top-ranked North American heading into the draft, according to NHL Central Scouting. He came to town Thursday.

The 18-year-old told reporters he wants the Oilers to take him with the first pick, but he'll still be happy if he ends up with the Boston Bruins after the second.

Seguin flew in from Toronto, had lunch with team officials, went to Oilers' owner Daryl Katz's house and toured Rexall Place, where the team plays.

He said after the day's festivities that he was particularly impressed with the arena's dressing room.

"Well, it was pretty cool … there's a lot of history in the Edmonton Oilers' dressing room," Seguin said. "I've been in a couple of other ones and I thought that's probably one of the best ones I've ever seen.

"And, you know, just growing up hearing about Wayne Gretzky, and obviously he's like the best player ever to play, and to be from Edmonton and to be here and see all that stuff, it was pretty cool."

Seguin said one of his more interesting experiences of the last few months was having NHL executives ask him questions to assess his personality. He and other potential draft picks were tested by the 2010 NHL Scouting Combine.

"The funniest or weirdest question was 'What would you prefer to have: a gun or a good poem?' So I said 'I think guns are destructive and I'm not very poetic, but I'd go with a good poem.'"

"The hardest question I got was, 'There are two players that are very similar in talent and skill-wise, but why is one player ranked higher than the other?'

"I sat there and I was like 'Well, maybe it's because of the market he's in, or something like that' and I realized it's because hockey is an entertainment business so you need a good personality as well."