How this year's NHL Draft Lottery Works and its Impact on the Ducks

So there appears to be a fair amount of confusion going around with how the draft lottery will work after the NHL announced its return to play format and the impact on the draft lottery, which is fair due to the NHL making the system a bit convoluted and confusing.

For Ducks fans, it is actually quite simple. The format is exactly the same now as it would have been had the 82 game season ended with the Ducks in 5th place. Their odds of winning the lottery for either the 1st, 2nd, or 3rd overall pick are around 9% each. See the chart below for the percentage odds for the draft position.

From Tankathon

Where the current format differs from the one above is how the NHL deals with the teams that are in the play-in. Instead of having teams for positions 8 through 15 in the draft order, the NHL now has placeholder team A through H with the same odds as shown above. See below for the NHL’s image on how the lottery will look along with the odds for each lottery.

If one of these placeholder teams wins the draft, then there will be a phase 2 draft lottery, once the play-in round is complete, to assign teams to the placeholder spot. This secondary draft will not be weighted, with each team having a 12.5% chance, or a 1 in 8 shot at being assigned to the placeholder team spot that won the lottery. When you put together the two drafts, any team in the qualifying round has about a 3% chance of winning the lottery. Team A-H has a combined 24.5% chance to win the lottery, and then if they do, a qualifying round team that loses has a 1 in 8 shot of getting that pick. To show the math .245*.125 = .03, so 3%.

Alright, I can see where the confusion comes in now, so let’s run through a few examples here:

Scenario 1:

The phase 1 draft lottery occurs and the Ducks win the first overall pick and all is right with the world, and then Detroit gets the second pick and Ottawa the third. Due to all three lotteries being won by teams in the 1-7 range, there is no need for the phase 2 draft. This scenario would cause the least amount of confusion

Scenario 2:

The phase 1 draft lottery happens and Detroit wins the first overall pick, Ottawa the second, and Team C the third overall pick. There is a need for the phase 2 draft once the qualifying round is complete to assign a team to that Team C position that won the lottery for the third pick. All teams that lose in the qualifying round will have a 12.5% chance to win that phase 2 lottery.

Scenario 3:

The phase 1 draft lottery happens and the Kings win the first pick, Team B the second pick, and Team H the third. Now there is a need for two phase 2 lotteries. One for the Team B spot and one for the Team H spot. The Team B spot being the better position will be done first so all teams that lost in the qualifying round will have a 12.5% chance in that lottery. Once that is complete, the second phase 2 draft will occur for the Team H spot with each team having a 14.3% chance at winning the lottery due to only 7 teams being in this lottery (The team that won the Team B spot is not eligible for the second phase 2 lottery).

Scenario 4:

The phase 1 draft lottery happens and Team A wins the first pick, Team C the second pick, and Team E the third. Similarly to scenario 3, there will be three phase 2 lotteries. The first will determine team A with each team in this lottery having a 12.5% chance at winning that lottery. The second to determine team C with each team having a 14.3% chance at winning that lottery. The third to determine team E with each team having a 16.7% chance to win that lottery.

Those percentages for the phase 2 lottery may seem high for teams, but keep in mind that in order to get to the phase 2 lottery, one of Team A through H must win one of the phase 1 draft lotteries.

Once these lotteries are complete, the rest of the teams will be placed in reverse order of points percentage. It is not officially confirmed, but it sounds like this applies to all teams in the league, which means the Ducks second 1st overall pick this year will be 31st.

All in all, the Ducks are in a decent spot for the draft. They have a 26% chance at ending up in the top 3 and can do no worse than the 8th position.