Love them or hate them, the NHL Draft Lottery results are in, and they have no shortage of people talking. Some fanbases woke up with a reason to celebrate, while others are convinced the hockey gods have it out for them. Nonetheless, the top 16 picks for this year’s draft are locked in, and Buffalo’s KeyBank Center will play host to it all on June 26th.
In the weeks between the lottery and draft day, the rumor mill runs on overdrive. Buzz builds around every top-five pick: who’s moving up, who’s shopping their slot, and which team is ready to flip a high pick for a win-now splash on the open market. The speculation is loud, the reports are endless, but seldom does anything major happen. When the dust settles, most teams do exactly what you’d expect: hold tight and take their guy. Nonetheless, let’s revisit some of the most recent instances in which a team selecting in the top five has moved its pick.
1. Islanders Move Out of the Top 5
On June 23rd, 2001, the Ottawa Senators traded center Alexei Yashin to the New York Islanders in exchange for the second overall pick in the 2001 draft, forward Bill Muckalt, and defenseman Zdeno Chára. Yashin would play five seasons on Long Island, putting up 290 points in 346 games before being bought out in 2007. The Senators used their newly acquired pick to select forward Jason Spezza out of the OHL. Spezza went on to be a cornerstone of the Ottawa forward group for 11 seasons, playing 686 of his 1,248 career games in a Senators jersey, where he tallied 436 assists and 687 points. The Senators won that trade decisively as Chára alone developed into one of the premier shutdown defensemen in the league and a future Norris Trophy winner in Boston.
2. Everyone is Happy in the End
It was widely expected that Medicine Hat Tigers defenseman Jay Bouwmeester, long considered the top prospect of the 2002 class, would be selected with the first overall pick. Columbus Blue Jackets GM Doug MacLean had other ideas. Minutes before the draft began at Toronto’s Air Canada Centre, MacLean swapped picks with the Florida Panthers, moving up from third to first overall. The trade also included Columbus giving Florida the right to swap first-round picks in 2003 as a sweetener. The deal was further contingent on Florida securing a promise from the Atlanta Thrashers, sitting at second overall, that they would not select Bouwmeester, ensuring the Panthers could still land their man at third, via CBC Sports. Atlanta obliged, after Florida offered a third and fourth round pick for compensation, taking Finnish goaltender Kari Lehtonen second overall, and Florida selected Bouwmeester third. Columbus used the first overall pick on London Knights winger Rick Nash, an 18-year-old power forward from Brampton, Ontario. Nash went on to play 1,060 career NHL games, 674 of which came in Columbus, where he tallied 289 goals and 547 points and became the franchise’s all-time leader in virtually every major offensive category. Bouwmeester also had a long and productive career, playing 1,240 games and finishing in the top 15 of Norris Trophy voting twice during his six seasons in Florida.
3. 2002 Take Two
The Florida-Columbus trade was not the only movement within the top five leading up to the 2002 NHL Draft. The Tampa Bay Lightning traded the fourth overall selection to the Philadelphia Flyers in exchange for Ruslan Fedotenko and the 34th and 52nd overall picks. Fedotenko spent four of his 12-year NHL career in Tampa, tallying 74 goals and 144 points in 313 games. He was also a key piece in Tampa’s 2004 Stanley Cup win, where he scored 12 goals in 22 playoff games. His 11th and 12th goals of that postseason game in Game 7 of the cup final in Tampa’s 2-1 victory over the Calgary Flames. The Flyers, on the other hand, selected Finnish defenseman Joni Pitkänen fourth overall. Pitkänen had a solid NHL career, playing 535 games in total, 206 of which were with the Flyers. Unfortunately for the Flyers, he never turned into the franchise defenseman they had hoped when they selected him on draft night in 2002.
4. Florida Gets Involved Again
On June 21st, 2003, the Florida Panthers traded their first overall selection to the Pittsburgh Penguins in exchange for forward Mikael Samuelsson and the third overall pick. Pittsburgh used the pick to select goaltender Marc-André Fleury, who became the first piece of a Penguins franchise that appeared in four Stanley Cup Finals between 2008 and 2017, winning three of them. Fleury retired as the second-winningest goaltender in NHL history with 575 wins. Florida used the third overall pick they received in return to select forward Nathan Horton, who went on to play 422 games as a Panther, recording 142 goals and 295 points. It was the second consecutive year Florida had traded away a top pick on draft day.
5. The Canes Trade Up
On June 26, 2004, the Columbus Blue Jackets traded their fourth overall draft pick to the Carolina Hurricanes in exchange for the eighth and 59th overall picks. Carolina selected forward Andrew Ladd at four. Although Ladd had a 1001-game NHL career, he only spent parts of three seasons in Carolina, where he registered 50 points in 137 games. Ladd’s rookie season was 2005-06, when Carolina won the Cup. At number eight, Columbus drafted forward Alexandre Picard. The French forward played in only 67 career games, all of them with the Blue Jackets.
6. A Franchise Defenseman on the Move
On September 13th, 2018, the Ottawa Senators sent a shockwave through the hockey world, trading defenseman Erik Karlsson and forward Francis Perron to the San Jose Sharks in exchange for Chris Tierney, Rudolfs Balcers, Dylan DeMelo, Joshua Norris, and a 2020 unprotected first-round pick. Karlsson spent five seasons in San Jose and put up 191 assists and 243 points in 293 games before being traded to Pittsburgh in 2023. That unprotected first-rounder Ottawa received in 2020 would turn into the number three overall selection in the draft, where the Senators selected winger Tim Stutzle. The German forward currently has 149 goals and 409 points in 447 career regular-season games with Ottawa and remains under contract with them through the 2030-31 season. While it was unbeknownst to the Sharks at the time that their unprotected pick would be inside the top five, it felt fitting to include it as it’s the only one we have seen in the last 20 years.
A Look Ahead at 2026
Which brings us to this years top five: Toronto at No. 1, San Jose at No. 2, Vancouver at No. 3, Chicago at No. 4, and New York (Rangers) at No. 5. As history shows, the window between the lottery and draft day is when the phone lines get busiest, and this year is no different, with the rumor mill already spinning around several of those slots. History tells us that most teams hold. The pressure to deal is loud, the rumors are relentless, and then draft day arrives, and everyone takes their guy. But every few years, someone pulls the trigger, and when they do, the ripple effects can last decades. Whether it’s a Stützle emerging from an unprotected pick buried in a blockbuster, or a Spezza born from a Yashin escape, the draft has a way of rewarding the bold and punishing the complacent. Come June 26th in Buffalo, we’ll find out which category this year’s top five falls into.
What I love about Toronto winning the draft lottery is that management actually thinks there problems are all solved.
It is not that they are all solved. Rather, there’s nothing that a competent GM can’t resolve. And they believe that they have a competent GM now.
They could be correct.
Not solved but if this helps reduce how high of a 1st they send Philly and Boston then its a win. if McKenna helps them get out of the top 10 next season thats a win.
still potential to make the playoffs too. moves will need to be made but its not impossible
It’s a win dependent wholly on how well those players play. A question we can’t answer for five years at least.
Typo on #3, the Panthers traded the 1st overall plus stuff to the Penguins for the 3rd overall plus stuff. The article says it was for a 3rd round pick at first but mentions it the 3rd overall later
Wilf, you are the only one to babble that Toronto management believes that one pick solves all their problems. Keep it up.
No one asked you
“unbenoucned” hahahaha.
Try “Unbeknownst”
Beonce-esque!
No one likes a Know it All Grapes
I like him. Why? He’s golden.
He is entitled to his opinion. And he is not a troll.
You are also entitled to your opinion. But you are trolling Wilf.
I love Wilf for his amusement value. His ability to be stunningly wrong on a consistent basis, yet with the utmost enthusiasm, is the stuff of a professional.
SJ is an elite D-man away from being a perennial contender for the next 10-15 years. (They need to look at Toronto to learn the lesson of how to not construct a roster focused on F’s.) That player is probably available in the top 3-5, but it’s too rich to spend the #2 o/a on one of them.
The Sharks have 3 teams that could provide a good return that helps them round out a SC roster.
Makar, Q Hughes, Seider, Dahlin, Heiskanen, Sanderson, Power too rich to spend on?
And how many of these are available in THIS draft? Pay attention.
The Islanders would never have made that mistake if they had a competent GM at the time. Mad Mike was just that, MAD! But Wang loved him. Come to think of it the Islanders haven’t had a competent GM since Bill Bow Tie Torrey. So far Darche is moving in the right direction.
Would a Rielly and 1st overall to Vancouver for their 1st, Hronek, Medvedev, and a 2nd work? Leafs then take either Malhotra, Verhoeff, Reid, or Carels. Ideally Malhotra.
Not a nucks fan, but the value between the 1OA and 3OA to Vancouver isn’t that. Rielly does nothing for them and Hronek has much more value than that; he’s likely VAN’s most valuable trade piece
sharks getting another top 5 is pathetic
The way this year played out, I didn’t think so. They actually tried to make the playoffs. Just some good luck that they were still able to pick in the top 5 after the lottery. This will probably be the last time in a long while that they will pick that high
you just backed up my point. celebrini is a super star, they are a playoff team, moving up 7 spots is an insane gift they did not deserve
This just in: if the Sharks are a playoff team, they would have been in the playoff field. Pretty simple concept.
Sharks take Stenberg at 2 OA, trade Graf to NYR for Schneider and a 3rd.
The Sharks definitely have to build the blue line, Had they been better in that department this past season, They could have made the playoffs, The wild West was up for grabs.
Would the Rangers have any interest in the Sharks 2nd pick for Schneider, Robertson, And, Morrow?
then the rags would have to search for D depth. But getting Stenberg would be a big +plus+
They’d have to be stupid not to be, but we’ve seen Drury work. No reason for the Sharks to do that for pieces. They need to get a 1/2 D; Schneider and Morrow are not that