Florida Wins Draft Lottery

Archived from 2002-03 season.

The Florida Panthers won the NHL's draft lottery and will pick first in the June draft. The Panthers finshed with the fourth-worst record in the league including the worst home record (8-21-7-5) in franchise history.

The draft drawing, conducted at the NHL's New York office, is a weighted system to give teams who finished with the fewest points during the regular season a greater chance of being selected.

The Panthers had the fourth-greatest likelihood, 10.7%, that one of the numbered sequences assigned to them would be the winning combination. Under the lottery system, only the five teams with the fewest points had the chance to win the first overall selection; no team could move up more than four spots.

The Carolina Hurricanes, who finished the regular season with the least points (61), had a 25-percent chance to win the top pick, followed by the Pittsburgh Penguins at 18.8 percent and Columbus at 14.2 percent.

Here is the order of selection:
1. Florida Panthers
2. Carolina Hurricanes
3. Pittsburgh Penguins
4. Columbus Blue Jackets
5. Buffalo Sabres
6. San Jose Sharks
7. Nashville Predators
8. Atlanta Thrashers
9. Calgary Flames
10. Montreal Canadiens
11. Philadelphia Flyers (from Phoenix)
12. New York Rangers
13. Los Angeles Kings
14. Chicago Blackhawks

The remaining first-round draft order will be determined by the results of the Stanley Cup playoffs.

The draft will be conducted at Gaylord Entertainment Center in Nashville, Tenn. on June 21-22.

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