Inside NHL draft lottery Blackhawks won for Connor Bedard
SECAUCUS, N.J. (AP) — The Chicago Blackhawks won the NHL draft lottery and the chance to select Connor Bedard long before Deputy Commissioner Bill Daly revealed it on national television.
The process to determine who got the No. 1 pick and Bedard, considered hockey’s top prospect since Connor McDavid, actually wrapped up about 80 minutes earlier in a small room at NHL Network studios. It also ended with the Anaheim Ducks getting the No. 2 pick.
The Associated Press was one of three media outlets represented among the roughly 20 people there to witness the potentially franchise-altering drawing. It was filmed for posterity and posted on the league’s website.
Here’s an inside look at how it all happened:
THE LEAD-UP
Daly, Commissioner Gary Bettman and several league executives milled about the room in the time leading up to the drawing. The lottery odds of every team that did not make the playoffs were frozen on one TV screen, while a spreadsheet showing an Excel sheet of the top 16 picks filled another.
Daly left the room, knowing nothing about the results he would later reveal.
A briefcase full of lottery balls sat on a table next to the blue machine featuring the 2023 NHL draft lottery logo. Senior executive vice president Steve Mayer told stories about draft lotteries past and said the time between the third and fourth (and final) lottery balls was the most dramatic.
At about 6:40 p.m. EDT, final preparations were made for the event, which required sequestering and technology blackouts to avoid anyone in the room leaking the results of the lottery. Phones were collected in manilla envelopes and stored away before the proceedings began, and Bettman announced: “If anyone’s not planning to stay in the room, now is the time to leave.”
THE DRAWING
With a camera rolling, Bettman started the proceedings by declaring it was approximately 6:45 p.m. and holding up the day’s editions of the Bergen Record, Wall Street Journal and New York Times as evidence it was indeed May…
