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NHL Draft 2017: Panthers drop down one, will pick tenth overall

The Florida Panthers, among other teams, got no love in the 2017 NHL Draft Lottery last night in Toronto.

Florida entered the proceedings with a 5.4% chance of picking first overall, a 5.7% chance of picking second and a 6% chance of claiming the third spot.

Well, none of that good stuff happened.

Instead, the Philadelphia Flyers made the biggest jump in NHL lottery history by moving up from thirteenth to grab the second overall spot, pushing the Panthers down from the ninth overall pick to tenth in the process.

Philadelphia wasn’t the only team to make a big move, as the four lottery favorites boasting double-digit odds didn’t have their cards pulled for any of the top three picks.

The New Jersey Devils, who had a 8.5% of winning, claimed the top pick in the draft, ascending from their pre-lottery five-hole. This is the second time New Jersey (2011) has won the draft lottery. The franchise also had the first overall pick in 1979 when they were still the Colorado Rockies.

The Devils and the Flyers are now in position to take the two clear-cut top prospects in the draft, forwards Nolan Patrick and Nico Hischier .

Great… more high-end talent in the Eastern Conference for the Cats to deal with…

The third overall pick was claimed by the Dallas Stars, originally slated to pick eighth, who made yet another big move up the draft board.

The teams that finished with the worst records and had the best odds, the Colorado Avalanche (18%), Vancouver Canucks (12.1%) and Arizona Coyotes (10.3%), each took a sizable plunge, and barring trade, will miss out on Patrick and Hischier.

Colorado dropped from first to fourth and Vancouver fell from second to fifth.

Luck wasn’t a lady last night for the Vegas Golden Knights, either. The expansion Knights had the same 10.3% odds as Arizona, but were NHL-mandated to draft no lower than sixth, meaning the hard-luck Coyotes took the biggest tumble, ending up with seventh overall pick after a 70-point season.

The end of the drawing means the order of the top fifteen picks in June’s entry draft is now set. The remaining sixteen spots will be determined by the results of the Stanley Cup playoffs.

  1. New Jersey Devils
  2. Philadelphia Flyers
  3. Dallas Stars
  4. Colorado Avalance
  5. Vancouver Canucks
  6. Vegas Golden Knights
  7. Arizona Coyotes
  8. Buffalo Sabres
  9. Detroit Red Wings
  10. Florida Panthers
  11. Los Angeles Kings
  12. Carolina Hurricanes
  13. Winnipeg Jets
  14. Tampa Bay Lightning
  15. New York Islanders

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