Top 3 ways the NHL 2024 Draft Lottery hurt the Blackhawks

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It wasn’t the news we were hoping for, as the Chicago Blackhawks weren’t fortunate enough to win the NHL Draft Lottery, which would have given them the top pick for the second season in a row. While they walked away with the second-overall pick and a stellar chance to land a future star, we know it won’t be Macklin Celebrini, and this one will sting in both the short and long run.

Before taking a deep dive into this, I will say that Connor Bedard will nonetheless play a pivotal role in turning this team around in time, as will whomever they take with the second pick. But a Celebrini-Bedard combo would have comprised a pair of first-overall picks taking center stage in expediting a rebuilding project for an organization that has fallen back into the dark ages lately.

Let’s take a deeper dive into why the lack of a Celebrini-Bedard combo hurts the Hawks this year before checking out two more reasons the NHL Draft Lottery hampered the organization.

No Macklin Celebrini-Connor Bedard combo brings a myriad of small setbacks

The good news is - and I can’t stress it enough - that the Blackhawks still have the second-overall pick and that means they will still have an outstanding player coming to the organization. Someone like Ivan Demidov will make a great complement to Bedard, but he will play another season in Russia before coming over to North America.

Regardless of whether the second pick is Demidov, Artyom Levshunov, Cayden Lindstrom, Anton Silyayev, or if someone else surges through the rankings over the next few weeks, a Macklin Celebrini-Connor Bedard combo would have been historic from Day 1.

This would have entailed a pair of sensational talents playing for one of the league’s most storied franchises. Such a situation wouldn’t have just been sensational not only for the Hawks but for the NHL. A Celebrini-Bedard combo also could have worked in so many ways, as they could have lined up alongside one another with one playing wing, on separate lines, or even in a combination.

We would have seen a pair of elite talents in their late teens setting the foundation for an incredible run that would have begun at the back half of the decade. This one hurts, even if a solid talent would still eventually wind up in Chicago.

Rebuild will theoretically take longer on many levels

It’s highly unlikely at this point that the second-overall pick would see NHL ice full-time (not that it couldn’t happen), and that alone will delay the rebuild. Not only would the rebuild have sped up with Celebrini in the organization, his presence would have catapulted it.

No, the Blackhawks wouldn’t have made the playoffs. In fact, they wouldn’t have even been a top 10 team in the Western Conference, but finishing the season with between 70 and 80 points would have ignited this fan base that is beginning to starve once again for a winner.

While Celebrini technically isn’t officially a San Jose Shark just yet, there’s a 100 percent chance that general manager Mike Grier won’t hesitate to call his name on June 28th. That said, not only will we be unable to witness what could have been the NHL’s next great one-two combo in so many ways, now we’re potentially looking at a 60-70-point season, even with Bedard taking what should be a huge leap in Year 2.

Look for the second-overall pick to likely join Bedard starting in 2025-26, and the rebuild will really take off. But, securing the rights to draft Celebrini would have put the franchise a year ahead of schedule.

Tougher to attract high-end free agents

While my personal philosophy for rebuilding a team in any sports league involves doing so through the draft and primarily promoting from within, I also understand what kind of benefits a Celebrini-Bedard combo may have had for the Blackhawks.

Sure, they will be fine in the long run and the rebuild will be fine. But in the ensuing years, players would want to come to Chicago and have played alongside Macklin Celebrini and Connor Bedard.

They would have wanted to be part of what could have, at the absolute worst, been a team in contention to make deep playoff runs year after year after year. We’re talking about eventually getting to the same level as where the Edmonton Oilers are with Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl or the Colorado Avalanche with Nathan MacKinnon and Mikko Rantanen.

Of course, only a handful of high-end free agents and solid role players would have signed, given ultimate salary cap restraints. But for years to come, there would have been a lot of demand to play in Chicago, even if that may not have been the case this summer since, as mentioned earlier, there would still be another year of building, even if the Hawks would have likely ended up with more points.

Sure, this team will be okay building around Bedard, and perhaps the Stanley Cup will return to Chicago multiple times. But the thought of what a Celebrini-Bedard combo would have brought to the Hawks and sooner rather than later might I add, is now something we’ll only be able to dream of.

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No Macklin Celebrini-Connor Bedard combo brings a myriad of small setbacks

Rebuild will theoretically take longer on many levels

Tougher to attract high-end free agents

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