The Florida Panthers may have fallen short of a three-peat as Stanley Cup champions this season, but tonight's NHL Draft Lottery offers a chance to turn a disappointing playoff miss into a promising future. With the eighth-lowest point total in the league, the Panthers managed to retain their first-round pick—a top-10 protected selection originally sent to the Chicago Blackhawks in the Spencer Knight/Seth Jones trade last March. Since only the top two picks in the 2026 NHL Draft are up for grabs in tonight's lottery (7 p.m. ET on ESPN), Florida can only drop as low as No. 10. But they're hoping to climb higher—first overall would be a dream, but second place would be a solid consolation.
The Vancouver Canucks lead the lottery odds at 18.5 percent, followed by the Blackhawks (13.5 percent) and the New York Rangers (11.5 percent). The Panthers sit at a respectable 6 percent chance. This year's draft class is considered deep, and landing in the top two could net Florida not just a high-end prospect, but potentially a player ready to step onto a team with Stanley Cup aspirations. Remarkably, no team has ever gone from the Stanley Cup Final one season to a top draft pick the next—a testament to how quickly fortunes can shift in the NHL.
For the Panthers, this past season feels like a blip on their championship radar. Keeping their first-round pick, especially after trading away their next two selections, feels like an unexpected gift. But Florida has lottery history on their side. They've won the draft lottery before, though under very different circumstances. The Panthers have only picked first overall twice in franchise history: in 1994, when they selected defenseman Ed Jovanovski as an expansion team (the lottery didn't start until 1995), and in 2014, when they moved up from second to first to grab another Windsor, Ontario-born blueliner, Aaron Ekblad. Both picks became cornerstones of the franchise. Now, with a roster built for contention, another stroke of lottery luck could set the stage for a quick return to glory.