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NHL Draft lottery live blog

Thumbnail image for 2010 NHL draft.jpg

Are you ready for some draft lottery?! Yes, there’s a fair bit of drama to this year’s lottery, mostly thanks to the Phil Kessel trade and what will happen with Toronto’s pick that belongs to the Boston Bruins. If you’ve missed any of our coverage from the past week, don’t worry, we’ve got you covered here and here.

Starting fresh at 8:00 PM ET you’ll want to keep refreshing with us here to get thoughts on the lottery process itself, one that Larry Brooks of the New York Post is eager to change.

There should be one standard and one standard alone for inclusion in the lottery for first overall, and that’s failure to make the playoffs. The 14 non-qualifiers should have an equal chance for the first selection in a sweepstakes that would remove the incentive for teams to lose down the stretch to fall as low in the standings as possible.

That would make it a bit more like the NBA Draft lottery but much more insane and as a fan of utter chaos, I approve.

Stick around, more analysis and thoughts await.

(8:02) TSN’s James Duthie lets us know that this is all about Taylor Hall and Tyler Seguin. Thing that I learned was that the right way to say Seguin’s name was to say it like his name was Carl Sagan. Shoot for the stars, right? RIGHT?!

(8:03) Duthie now makes everyone at home smirk and giggle saying something a bit untoward about lottery ping pong balls.

(8:06) The panel of GMs here look like a panel of undertakers. Fitting since most of their teams played like skating corpses.

(8:09) The draft lottery party/Tweet-Up in Edmonton appears to be out of control. After a season like the Oilers had... This is their Stanley Cup Game 7.

(8:15) TSN’s Bob McKenzie reports that the consensus top guy amongst GMs is Taylor Hall. Tyler Seguin is the #2 guy and Team USA junior member defenseman Cam Fowler is #3 guy. Whoever is picking third really won’t be losing out a whole lot getting Fowler, he’ll be tremendous in the NHL.

(8:16) Nino Niederreiter from Switzerland who made a name for himself at the World Junior Championships cracks McKenzie’s Top 10. Niederreiter, by far, has the coolest name amongst the top picks.

(8:18) Duthie goes back over the odds for the teams in the lottery. It’s loaded up so the Oilers have the best shot at the top overall pick. Teams outside of the top five cannot get the #1 pick.

(8:19) Number five goes to... the New York Islanders, holding steady.

Number four goes to the Columbus Blue Jackets. Again, holding to form.

(8:20) Number three goes to... Florida. No drama.

Number one goes to... Edmonton and gets the first overall pick for the first time in their history. The number two pick goes to the Boston Bruins thanks to the Maple Leafs and solidifies that Brian Burke will answer questions about the Phil Kessel trade for the rest of his days in Toronto.