Nashville Predators Find Out Draft Lottery Fate
The wait is over. The Nashville Predators now know where they will be drafting in the first round of the 2026 NHL Draft.
The NHL Draft lottery was held ahead of tonight’s Minnesota Wild versus Colorado Avalanche second round playoff game. The Predators had high hopes of avoiding falling a spot or two in the lottery and had some hopes of even winning the lottery.
In the first round of the draft, the Predators will be picking No. 10 overall.
Going into the lottery, the Predators were projected to be picking 10th, with a 73.3% chance of it happening. Nashville also had a 3.5% chance of winning the lottery and also a small chance of jumping eight spots to the second overall pick.
The Predators are coming off a season in which they went 38-34-10 and had 86 points in the Western Conference, four points shy of the final playoff spot. Nashville missed the playoffs for the second consecutive year as a below average finish to the season kept them out of the postseason picture.
The Predators season will be remembered as one that had a bad start that forced them to play catch up the rest over the final 60 games. But they were a team that did respond and found themselves in the playoff conversation before ultimately being eliminated by the San Jose Sharks in the final week of the regular season.
In Bleacher Report’s latest mock draft, the outlet has Nashville selecting left and right winger Adam Novotny of the OHL’s Peterborough Petes.
Over the next month-and-a-half, there will be plenty of speculation as to who the Predators will ultimately take with their first round pick. But what is for certain is that Nashville has got to get its first round pick correct. It may take some time for what could be its next best prospect to make the roster, but the Predators have to right the ship in terms of how they have historically drafted.
In the franchise’s history, the Predators have typically been a team that has not been the best at hitting on their first round picks. As Nashville undergoes a changing of the guard at the general manager position, this first round pick is an important one.
The first round of the 2026 NHL Draft is set to take place July 26 and will take place in Buffalo, New York.
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Graham Baakko is a lead writer for both Nashville Predators On SI and Vanderbilt Commodores On SI, primarily covering football, basketball and baseball. Graham graduated from the University of Alabama, where he wrote for The Crimson White, WVUA-FM, WVUA 23 as he covered a variety of Crimson Tide sports. He also covered South Carolina athletics as an intern for GamecockCentral.