The one 1st-round draft pick silver lining to Panthers' nightmare season

The one 1st-round draft pick silver lining to Panthers' nightmare season originally appeared on The Sporting News. Add The Sporting News as a Preferred Source by clicking here.

The Florida Panthers entered this season hoping to three-peat as Stanley Cup champions.

Instead, they ended the campaign as one of the 10-worst teams in the NHL.

It was an odd year, with injuries right from the outset paired with declines of key players. The Panthers just never found their stride.

There's pretty much just one silver lining, and it has to do with their first-round draft pick for the 2026 NHL Draft.

The Panthers traded that pick away, sort of.

When they got Seth Jones from the Chicago Blackhawks, this pick went to Chicago, top-10 protected. That means if it ends up in the top-10 picks this year, Florida keeps it (and conveys their 2027 pick to the Blackhawks instead).

At the time of the deal, it sure would've seemed like the Panthers would've been in the playoffs again and be giving the Blackhawks a pick in the back half of the first round.

Now, the Panthers have a good chance of keeping the selection and hopefully jumpstarting a bounceback season by adding a talented young player.

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The Panthers seem most likely to end up with the eighth-best lottery odds. If that happens, the pick can end up no worse than 10th, and it would stay with Florida.

The eighth-best lottery odds include a 6.0% chance of the first pick, 6.2% chance of second, 0.2% chance of third; and then 54.4% chance of eighth, 30.0% of ninth and 3.2% of tenth.