Vancouver Canucks Fall in the Draft Lottery to Fifth Overall

For the second consecutive season, the Vancouver Canucks will possess the fifth overall pick at the NHL Entry Draft.

Though the Canucks finished the 2016-17 season with 69 points and the 29th best record in the NHL, they lost three consecutive lotteries to fall three spots from second overall to fifth. The Dallas Stars, Philadelphia Flyers and New Jersey Devils. The Draft lottery is as follows:

While many Canucks fans, and surely the organization themselves, will feel shorted by the lottery draw, the fact of the matter is that probability isn’t always destiny and tonight’s results reinforce as much. Fifth overall was the second most likely draft position for the Canucks, with a 30.7 percent chance of falling there. Their most likely destination was fourth overall.

The lesson here isn’t that tanking doesn’t work under the current system. One more point and the Canucks would be selecting seventh overall as opposed to fifth, which says nothing of the six rounds that follow and their positions therein. It’s that even the best odds sometimes aren’t good enough, but there’s still a reward worth chasing, and picking fifth instead of seventh is still a reward well worth its cost in losses.

I get why Canucks fans are frustrated. Vancouver needs a high-end prospect to get out of the four seasons-plus malaise that has taken this once mighty franchise from the top of the league to its gutter in near perpetuity. At the same time, they’ve a relatively good chance of finding that player at fifth overall.

The good news is, I think the Canucks have a few more draft lotteries in their future. Perhaps tonight’s defeat will make the reward of first overall all the sweeter. Especially if that happens in a year with a generational talent.