Dig all you want, but the dirt that comes up on Jack Hughes is clean.

The 18-year-old American center who is expected to go No. 1 to the Devils in the first round of the NHL draft Friday in Vancouver has been defined by his poise in the spotlight. He has been considered the most talented player in this draft class for almost two years, and in that time, he has dealt with countless media requests and countless opposing defenders wanting to get the best of him. He has dealt with lauding pundits and spiteful skeptics alike.

OK, so he has a sneaker collection. OK, so he likes to play golf and relax with his friends. Other than that? Well, there’s a reason he’s considered the best hockey player to come through the draft since Auston Matthews in 2016.

“There is so much confidence,” his coach at the U.S. Developmental Program, John Wroblewski, told The Post. “There’s not a room that he steps into where he isn’t comfortable.”

Wroblewski had a relationship with the Hughes family from having coached Jack’s older brother, Quinn, prior to Quinn being selected No. 7-overall by the Canucks last year. And Quinn never once questioned that this moment would come.

“No kid doesn’t think he isn’t going to live out his dream, but for me, I always thought he was going to be in this position because he was always the best player,” Quinn told The Post over the phone from atop a mountain in Vancouver on Wednesday night. “I always thought he would be where he is right now.”

The Hughes are a big hockey family. The father, Jim, had been an assistant coach for the Bruins and a director of player development for the Maple Leafs before recently being hired to work for the agency, CAA. And the mother, Ellen, played on the women’s silver-medal winning hockey team in the 1992 World Championships. Quinn reiterated how Jack was competitive in everything, from golf to tennis.

So Wroblewski made a special house call and made a video presentation to convince Jack to attend the program. When Jack then showed up for orientation the following summer, he was walking through the parking lot with some new teammates. He saw Wroblewski, whose nicknamed is “Robo,” and called over to him.

“Hey, Robo, how you doing?” Wroblewski remembered Hughes saying. That required a quick talking to, but one that came with a caveat.

“I walked up to him and said, ‘Jack, I’m not your buddy, I’m your coach,’ and I said it with a straight face,” Wroblewski said. “But as I walked away, I was chuckling to myself and had a smile on face because it just shows you what kind of confidence the kid had.

“It wasn’t disrespectful, but he knew what he was. He knew what he was destined for.”

In July 2017, Hughes was invited to a prestigious skills camp in Toronto with some of the NHL’s elite talent. The league’s director of central scouting, Dan Marr, was there to observe. To say he was impressed would be an understatement.

“The best three players on the ice were Taylor Hall, Connor McDavid and John Tavares. The next best player was Jack Hughes,” Marr said. “It was a series of skill drills they were doing that involved skating and quickness, speed, execution, precision. Right away, you could see [Hughes] already has a NHL shot, for example. He’s got that talent. He belongs in that group.”

That was reinforced in May when Hughes went with Team USA to the World Championships in Slovakia, playing against the best men in the world (who were not in the late stages of the NHL playoffs). He said he learned the most from being around some of his idols, most notably Patrick Kane — the diminutive American, just like Hughes, who went No. 1 to the Blackhawks and has carved out one of the best careers in league history.

Kane had some glowing words about his young protege — “I think he does a lot of things better than me” — and when that comment was brought to Hughes’ attention, Hughes showed a humility that was not without a streak of confidence.

“I think he’s full of crap,” Hughes said at the NHL combine in Buffalo in late May. “That’s a guy that’s got three [Stanley] Cups, Art Rosses, Hart Trophies, Conn Smtyhes. You name it, he’s got it. Almost to hear your name out of his mouth is humbling.”

But it seems like by the end of this week, it’s going to be Hughes’ name likely coming out of the mouth of Devils general manager Ray Shero, who has the enviable situation of choosing between Hughes and big-bodied Finnish winger Kaapo Kakko as the top-overall selection.

Some might be concerned about Hughes’ size — he says he’s 5-foot-11, while he’s listed an inch shorter, and weighs in around 170 pounds. But for the people who have seen him play a lot and project these types of prospects into a league that has dramatically shifted to be focused on speed and skill, the lack of size does not seem to be a deterrent.

“The NHL clubs, they don’t look at size anymore,” Marr said. “They look at good players, the best players, what they bring to the table. Scouting has changed in that way, too. You don’t pick apart a player and look at what they don’t do well, because that can be [from] coaching. You look at what they bring to the table, what they do well.

“With the level that these kids are competing at, and they can deliver, chances are they can deliver when they get to the National Hockey League.”

Wroblewski also remembered that when Hughes first took the ice for games with the developmental program, the opposition “had this massive bull’s-eye on him.” But Hughes darted and slashed in and out of traffic, creating scoring opportunities and potting more than a few goals himself. If he happened to go through a slump, he would make a slight change in practice. If he was getting frustrated with all the media requests, he would make a slight adjustment to his schedule to find time for his obligations and to make sure he relaxed.

“That bodes so well for him,” Wroblewski said, “that he’s able to make these micro-adjustments without changing who he really is.”

At 18, Hughes has all the attributes of a pro. That’s why he is so highly thought of, why he is likely going to be the top pick, and why he has the chance to excel in the NHL.

“I’m telling you this: He’s going to be a superstar as a center-ice man in that league,” Wroblewski said. “It’s going to break a mold, and there is going to be a generation of kids that want to be Jack Hughes.”