Isles GM Snow has meltdown at draft

PHILADELPHIA — NHL commissioner Gary Bettman endured Flyers fans’ boos during the first round of the draft at Wells Fargo Center Friday night, but Islanders GM Garth Snow doesn’t take as well to being dumped on.

Knowing his 28th overall selection of character-concern OHL center Joshua Ho-Sang, 18, would be questioned, Snow was caught on an NHL Network feed around 10 p.m. saying on stage: “He’ll fit right in. They s--- on me, too.

Minutes later, Snow was asked to reiterate his take on the outside perception.

“They can’t s--- on me any more than they do, I think is what I said. I don’t care,” Snow said. “We get players that we feel can help us win a championship, and we don’t give a s--what anyone else thinks — except our fans, of course.”

Snow’s late-night venting added spice to what otherwise would have been an uneventful first round.

The Islanders took left wing Michael Dal Colle, 18, of the OHL’s Oshawa Generals, fifth overall. Dal Colle has an inspirational story: according to NHL.com his role model and older brother, Jonluca, is autistic, and his mother, Wendy, was diagnosed with breast cancer seven years ago and has been clear since 2009.

Then Snow, who started this draft with nine total picks, traded the 35th and 57th overall selections to Tampa Bay to acquire the 28th pick and select Ho-Sang, a 5-11, 175-pound forward from Toronto who recently told the Toronto Sun: “If I was a general manager and had first pick in the draft, I’d pick me No. 1. . . . In three years, I’ll be the best player in this draft. And I have no doubt about that.”

The 28th overall pick originally belonged to the Rangers, who traded it to Tampa Bay along with next year’s first-rounder in exchange for Martin St. Louis this spring. The Rangers were in attendance but will not select until Saturday, when they own five picks from the second through seventh rounds.

They acquired their fifth pick of the draft Friday by dealing fourth-line winger Derek Dorsett to the Vancouver Canucks and his former junior coach, Willie Desjardins, for an extra third-round pick (85th overall). Dorsett will have a $1.63 million cap hit next season, so the Blueshirts cleared some space and likely will be able to afford a similar player in Dan Carcillo at a lesser price.

The Canucks were extremely active, trading center Ryan Kesler and a 2015 third-round pick to the Anaheim Ducks in exchange for center Nick Bonino, defenseman Luca Sbisa and 2014 first-round and third-round picks. And the Pittsburgh Penguins traded scoring winger James Neal, a questionable character guy, to the Nashville Predators for forwards Patric Hornqvist and Nick Spaling.

The Devils selected WHL center John Quenneville, 18, with the 30th and final pick of the first round.