Toronto Maple Leafs Can Still Win NHL Draft Lottery

The NHL announced it’s protocol for the NHL Draft Lottery this week and the Toronto Maple Leafs actually have a chance at winning it.

Yes, I repeat, the Toronto Maple Leafs could have the number-one overall pick.

If anyone else sat there watching Gary Bettman explain the NHL Draft Lottery rules and felt that their head was going to explode, you’re not alone. I felt like Winona Ryder at the SAG Awards trying to understand all of the moving parts.

Here we go.

NHL Draft Lottery

So, you have the seven teams that are finished for the regular season and then you’ll have another eight teams who will lose in the play-in games that are not decided yet called Team A, B, C, D, E, F, G and H.

The NHL will do their scheduled Draft Lottery on June 26th with the following odds for the number-one overall pick scheduled for each team:

• Detroit Red Wings – 18.5 percent 
• Ottawa Senators – 13.5 percent
• Ottawa Senators (from San Jose Sharks) – 11.5 percent
• Los Angeles Kings – 9.5 percent
• Anaheim Ducks – 8.5 percent
• New Jersey Devils – 7.5 percent
• Buffalo Sabres – 6.5 percent
• Qualifying Round Team A – 6.0 percent
• Qualifying Round Team B – 5.0 percent
• Qualifying Round Team C – 3.5 percent
• Qualifying Round Team D – 3.0 percent
• Qualifying Round Team E – 2.5 percent
• Qualifying Round Team F – 2.0 percent
• Qualifying Round Team G  – 1.5 percent
• Qualifying Round Team H – 1.0 percent

When the NHL does it’s first Draft Lottery, if the first three picks are won by those seven teams who missed the play-in/playoffs, the lottery is over.

For example, if it goes as followed: Detroit wins 1st overall, Ottawa 2nd overall and Ottawa 3rd overall, the NHL Draft Lottery is complete.

Here’s where things get tricky.

Let’s say Qualifying Round Team H wins the NHL Draft Lottery, followed by Detroit 2nd and Ottawa 3rd. There will then be another Draft Lottery at a later date when those teams are out of the playoffs.

By hypothetical Team H winning, it doesn’t mean that a certain team actually wins yet. All eight of those teams that lose in their play-in game will now all have a 12.5 percent chance at that number-one overall pick.

Are you following? Because, it took me a few hours to figure this one out.

This is where the Toronto Maple Leafs fit into the scenario.

If the Leafs lose to the Columbus Blue Jackets in the play-in game, they will become one of those hypothetical Team A, B, C, D, E, F, G or H.

So, if the scenario were to end with the hypothetical Team H winning the NHL Draft Lottery, the Toronto Maple Leafs and seven other teams that lost in the play-in games will all now have a 12.5 percent chance at winning the NHL Draft Lottery.

Therefore, the team would actually have a shot at scheduled number-one overall pick, Alexis Lafrenière.

To put a wrinkle in this whole mess, it could also turn out that the Leafs don’t end up with a first-round pick at all because there was a condition on that draft pick in their trade with the Carolina Hurricanes.

If the Toronto Maple Leafs pick is in the top 10 of the 2020 NHL Draft, the Hurricanes will receive Toronto’s first round pick next year instead.

So there you have it.

It’ll take a long shot for the Leafs to actually win the NHL Draft Lottery, but it’s possible.

Regardless of what happens, it’s fun to be talking about real NHL events again and I know I’ll be tuning in on June 26th to see what happens.