NHL Draft lottery rumored for end of June, will the Rangers be involved?
Yesterday, several insiders noted that the NHL may conduct the Draft Lottery on June 26th which was the actual original draft date. While that is not official it is very likely to be close to that date. This would be the first major event by the league to ramp up interest right around the time camps would open up. The news is exciting, but raises so many questions.
NHL Draft Lottery Speculation
TVA reporter Renaud Lavoie broke the rumor that the NHL is looking at a June 26th date for the lottery. That got the ball rolling on exactly what the lottery will look like, and TSN’s Bob McKenzie noted that the 7 teams not in the 24 team return to play scenario will all be in the lottery. The real speculation was will the 15 teams that normally do not make it also be involved?
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Win-Win for Rangers
At the moment, leading speculation indicates that in order to make sure there is enough interest and drama it will include the normal 15 teams. That raises a ton of questions, but to simplify the other 8 lottery teams would be the losers of the “play-in” round. So using the Rangers as an example, if they and all the lower seeded teams lost their play-in series, the Rangers would receive the appropriate balls for 13th which they were at when the season paused.
Ultimately, McKenzie qualified this information more as “spitballing” and that he expects the NHL to have more solid information in the next 24-48 hours. Either way, there is a great chance for the Rangers to benefit by getting playoff experience for their young team, but also getting a chance to move up in the draft if they lose.
Reminder: My source with the league informed me on May 21st, that the draft is going to be help in September.
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