Updated Power Tankings for the No. 1 Pick in the 2024 NHL Draft

Updated Power Tankings for the No. 1 Pick in the 2024 NHL Draft0 of 5

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Some teams are establishing themselves as contender for the Stanley Cup at the halfway point of the 2023-24 NHL season.

There are others, down at the opposite end of the league standings, that are positioning themselves for the top pick in the 2024 NHL Draft—or at least the best draft lottery odds for the top pick.

Today we are going to take a look at the five teams best positioned for that spot in an updated version of the NHL Power Tankings.

It is important to keep in mind when we make any reference to “tanking” that we know the players and coaches are not tanking. Players are not wired that way and coaches have too much to lose to give games away. Most of the players on these current rosters will not even be there when a potential top pick arrives or begins to make an impact, so they really do not care about draft pick positioning, Their only goal is to win games and play for jobs either on their current team or for a potential future team.

Front office’s, however, can make some strategic decisions with trades and roster construction to potentially position themselves for those draft lottery odds to be in their favor.

There is no Sidney Crosby, Connor McDavid or Connor Bedard type prospect at the top of this year’s class, but Macklin Celebrini from Boston College figures to be the top player available. He does have massive potential and would be a welcome addition to any of these rosters.

With all of that said, let’s take a look at some of the teams that could be positioned to have the best NHL Draft lottery odds.

5. Columbus Blue Jackets1 of 5

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The worst part about the Columbus Blue Jackets being in this position is they really made an effort to try and be good the past two seasons.

They just failed spectacularly.

Pretty much every move they have made has been the wrong move at the wrong time, whether it was last year’s free agency splurge on Johnny Gaudreau and Erik Gudbranson, or this year’s trades for defenseman Ivan Provorov and Damon Severson.

They also never did anything to meaningfully address their biggest weakness from the past couple of years—goaltending.

The Blue Jackets picked No. 3 a year ago (and selected Adam Fantilli) and look to be in a position to end up with yet another top-five pick. The only question that might need to be asked here is which general manager might be making that pick, because there is no way Jarmo Kekkalainen gets to still keep building this team after the way the past few years have gone, right? At some point these underwhelming results and failed attempts to win have to result in some sort of a change.

4. Ottawa Senators2 of 5

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What a mess and bitter disappointment this season has turned out to be.

It started with promise. It started with hope. The Senators had an exciting top six filled with impact forwards and a couple of emerging superstars in Tim Stutzle and Brady Tkachuk. The defense had Thomas Chabot, Jake Sanderson and last year’s trade deadline addition of Jakob Chychrun. They went out and spent big on goalie Joonas Korpisalo to try and fix the position.

None of it has produced a winning team, and it has actually resulted in a major step backward from where they were a year ago.

Unlike the other teams in the bottom five, the Senators actually have the talent to maybe play their way out of this position. But the defense and goaltending are going to have to dramatically improve for that to happen.

The interesting twist for the Senators is they have to forfeit one of their next three first-round draft picks because of sanctions from their role in an Evgenii Dadonov trade that was rejected by the league over a failure to disclose his no-trade clause. The Senators have until within 24 hours of the draft to decide if they will forfeit the pick or push that decision off to a future season.

If the Senators end up anywhere in the top five, and especially in the top three, there is no chance they will opt to forfeit this year’s pick.

3. Anaheim Ducks3 of 5

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Through the first month of the season, the Ducks looked like a team that might have a chance to be a positive surprise in the Western Conference. On November 14, they were 9-6-0 and had a high-scoring offense that was led by Frank Vatrano and Mason McTavish. Along with an emerging star in Leo Carlsson and their promising young group of forwards, there was a little bit of hope this season could be interesting.

It did not last long at all, and reality quickly set in.

Since that 9-6-0 start, the Ducks are just 5-21-1 in the games since and have quickly fallen down to the NHL’s basement.

Injuries to players like Carlsson and Trevor Zegras are not going to help matters, and neither will any future trades that happen prior to the deadline.

Vatrano, Adam Henrique and perhaps even starting goalie John Gibson (who has had a decent season) all figure to be potential trade candidates as they continue to look for future assets.

The draft lottery has not been kind to the Ducks over the years. They lost out on Sidney Crosby back in 2005 when they got the No. 2 pick, and they lost out on a chance for Connor Bedard a year ago, again finishing with the No. 2 pick.

The Ducks have never picked No. 1 overall in their franchise history.

2. Chicago Blackhawks4 of 5

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Nobody involved in the organization will admit it, but last year’s Blackhawks team was designed to be terrible in the hopes they could land Connor Bedard to jumpstart their rebuild.

Even though the Blackhawks did not finish with NHL’s worst record, they still had draft lottery luck on their side and ended up winning the first pick and the right to select Bedard. They might be well positioned to land another potential franchise player this season, and this time it is not all by design.

The Blackhawks are still very much in the middle of their rebuild, but the addition of Bedard was also met with some veteran additions—specifically Taylor Hall, Nick Foligno, Corey Perry and Ryan Donato—that at least provided some hope things could be a little better on the ice.

Things have not really been better. The team is still young and evolving as part of its rebuild, but the roster has also been decimated by injuries and other issues.

Perry’s contract had to be determined. Hall and several other veterans suffered injuries that sidelined them. Bedard opened the season looking like a potential megastar until he also left the lineup with an injury.

Even a fully healthy Blackhawks team was going to struggle to compete and thus be in the running for a top pick. Take away all of the players they lost to injuries, and things rapidly became infinitely worse. They are not that far ahead of the San Jose Sharks for the league’s worst record, and they figure to be major sellers again at the deadline. They might not be out of the running for the best lottery odds.

1. San Jose Sharks5 of 5

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Even before the 2023-24 season began, this is where we all expected the Sharks to be.

After trading Brent Burns, Timo Meier and Erik Karlsson over the past year-and-a-half—which followed a multiyear playoff drought—it was pretty clear a massive rebuild was beginning and that it was going to take time.

The roster looked to be one of the worst in the NHL, and perhaps one of the worst ones we have seen in years when it comes to the defense and goaltending. San Jose has played about as poorly as could have been expected.

Following Saturday’s 5-4 loss to the Ottawa Senators, the Sharks remain cemented into the league’s worst record and are just 1-12 in their past 13 games. They have also somehow managed to lose 10 games in a row on two separate occasions in just the first half of the season, and they’re last in the NHL in goals scored and goals against,

It is a miserable team whose only hope is winning the draft lottery.

Even before they sell off anymore players at the deadline, they looked poised to secure the best odds.