Winning some games lately has changed the Pens’ positioning for the lottery draft
Our semi-regular feature about the Sunday Standings has fallen into disarray with the Penguins no longer remotely competitive for a playoff spot and so many weekend games getting in the way.
But with the calendar about to turn to April and most teams having single-digit games left in the 2024-25 season remaining there is a new focus and importance to consider with the Pens. It revolves around the bottom of the league and the lottery draft.
As of this morning, courtesy of Tankathon, here’s an outlook based on points percentage.
The Penguins have far from folded up their tents, they’re playing pretty well in the last 10 games in large part due to a revitalized Tristan Jarry and some serious offensive inputs by Sidney Crosby and his line. There have been a couple of stinkers last week along the way — when the Pens “don’t have it” on a certain night they really don’t have it and tend to drop away to a blowout loss without much of a fight, but often times Pittsburgh has buckled down and battled admirably despite their playoff chances evaporated. The same can be said about the Buffalo Sabres, who have been no pushover lately and getting results down the stretch.
On the other hand, several teams have seemingly quit on this year. The Boston Bruins were dealt a heavy blow when their captain Brad Marchand was traded. Since then, it’s been downhill in a major way with eight straight losses. The Bruins are in a sad, sad state of affairs these days. Similarly, it looked like Philadelphia was going straight down the drain until John Tortarella went and got himself fired and now the Flyers have won a couple in a row with the interim coach bounce. That might be good for them in the long run (especially to be free from Torts) but that’s bad for the draft pick.
It’s a two horse race for the best odds of the draft between Chicago and San Jose — the same two teams who have won the last two lottery drafts. Since teams can only win the lottery draft two times in a five year span under a recent 2022 rule change, winning the lottery this year would eliminate either CHI or SJ from being eligible to win the 2026 first overall pick.
Another key for the Penguins is the Rangers’ pick, given that Pittsburgh will be transferred it if it’s 14th or higher (as in, worse). NYR has been impossible to get a handle on, they’ll win a few games and you’ll think they have finally gotten their stuff together only to watch them go through a bad week where it looks like they’ll never figure it out and that they’ve squandered their chance. The Wild Card race for the last playoff spot has been totally chaotic and with just over two weeks left here at the chances, according to The Athletic’s model:
- Columbus: 29%
- NY Rangers: 28%
- Montreal: 23%
- NY Islanders: 17%
- Detroit: 4%
This ending is the NHL’s dream to have so many teams and markets invested in a super tight finish. If the Rangers make the playoffs, their draft pick will be 17+. However, the good news for the Pens is that playoff results don’t alter draft pick positioning until the Conference Finals. So as long as the Rangers don’t win two playoff rounds, they still are likely to be transferring the 17th or 18th selection to Pittsburgh. It gets dicey, of course, if NYR doesn’t make the playoffs at all and is right on that borderline of that 13th overall pick.