The Vancouver Canucks entered Tuesday night's draft lottery with the best odds of landing the No. 1 pick. They left with a sinking feeling that could haunt the franchise for years.

History has a cruel way of reminding teams what could have been. Just look at the 2004 NHL Draft. Everyone remembers the top two picks: Alex Ovechkin and Evgeni Malkin, two of the greatest players to ever lace up skates. After that? It's a wasteland. The third pick that year didn't produce a franchise cornerstone, and the drop-off was steep.

Now, the Canucks are staring at a similar nightmare scenario. This year's draft class features two elite prospects at the top: Gavin McKenna and Ivar Sternberg. Vancouver did everything right to position themselves for one of them. They traded away veteran talent, endured a grueling season, and finished with the league's fewest points. The tank was executed to perfection.

But the lottery balls didn't cooperate. The Canucks fell to the third pick, and there's a real chance both McKenna and Sternberg will be off the board by the time they're on the clock. It's the kind of misfortune that makes you wonder if the hockey gods have it out for this franchise.

To be fair, it's not a perfect comparison. Nobody expects McKenna and Sternberg to become the next Ovechkin and Malkin. But they're both projected to be game-changing talents, and passing on either would sting. The Canucks were dreaming of McKenna. Even settling for Sternberg would have been acceptable. Now, they might get neither.

For a team that has endured its share of heartbreak, this feels like another chapter in a long, painful story. The Canucks did the hard part—they lost enough to earn the best lottery odds. But the draft lottery is a cruel game of chance, and this time the odds didn't fall their way.

Only time will tell if this becomes Vancouver's 2004 moment—a draft that looked promising but delivered nothing but regret.