The annual lottery that determines who gets the first overall pick at this year’s NHL Entry Draft will be held tonight and for some clubs it’s the opportunity to draft a cornerstone prospect to build their future Stanley Cup contending team around.

The rules have changed surrounding the lottery as we outlined here last week.  In prior years a team could only move up the draft by a maximum of four spots of where they finished the season.  This year, every team of the fourteen that missed the playoffs can win the draft lottery but it remains a weighted procedure to ensure the lowest ranked clubs have the best shot.

So who will win this year’s draft lottery?  The Florida Panthers have the best odds with 25% followed by the Colorado Avalanche at 18.8%.  The Tampa Bay Lightning are currently slotted third and have a 14.2% chance of winning while the Nashville Predators and Carolina Hurricanes round out the top five and have a 10.7 and 8.1% chance respectively.

The Edmonton Oilers who have owned the draft lottery for the past three seasons are in the hunt again this year albeit the odds are stacked against them with just a 4.7% chance of getting the top pick this year.  Dare we count them out?  It’s hard not to given their luck at last year’s draft but with the revised odds for this year’s lottery we might finally have a year when the Oilers aren’t called upon first to kick off the draft.

As always, we’ll have you covered right here at Too Many Men with all the latest news, updates and analysis from the draft lottery.

As McKenzie noted on Wednesday Night Hockey on TSN, the Oilers don’t need another young body that might be a year or two away from being NHL ready.

“What the Edmonton Oilers really don’t need is another 18-year-old blue chipper. They need some help right now and using that first round pick as currency could get them that help right now … (or) … They may use the pick, but they may try and parlay it into something immediate.”

Often criticized for failing to re-build the Oilers, Steve Tambellini was fired earlier this month in favor of former Oilers head coach and player Craig MacTavish.

When listening to the press conference that introduced MacTavish as the new GM, it was he who stated the club needs to make drastic changes.  McKenzie feels that trading away their top draft position would certainly qualify as a “bold” move.

Furthermore, Darren Dreger of TSN also notes that MacTavish could make several moves in an attempt to upgrade the Oilers roster, including in goal.

As it sits right now the Oilers would be drafting no worse than seventh overall and still have an outside chance to win the lottery and the first overall pick.  Depending on where they finish in the standings with two games remaining will determine their odds tow in the first overall pick.  Should they win the draft lottery for the fourth consecutive year it’d be a heated debate amongst Oilers fans on whether or not the club should trade it or draft Seth Jones, a highly sought after defenseman.

If the past has proven anything it’s that the Oilers need to trade their top draft pick regardless of where they wind up picking.  Get an immediate improvement for one of the many holes on the roster and start the re-tooling process the right way.

The Oilers official Twitter account confirmed over the weekend that Nugent-Hopkins will be flying to Cleveland to have his shoulder examined and that surgery is likely for the 20-year old.

The rising star admitted to the Canadian Press that this injury has been bothering him for quite some time and is finally at the point where he needs to address it more seriously.

“It’s something that’s been nagging at me for a couple years. It got a little bit worse and it’s something that has to be taken care of eventually. We all decided it was time.” – courtesy of TSN.ca.

Last season Nugent-Hopkins missed twenty games due to the injury and his numbers this season have been lower than many expected, pointing to the shoulder injury as the main cause.

Through 40 games this season, the former first overall pick has just 4 goals and 20 assists for the Oilers after coming off a rookie season that saw him post 52 points in 62 games last season.

The injury is oddly similar to the one Taylor Hall sustained last season that saw him go under the knife.  The intent is to have Nugent-Hopkins fully recovered for the start of next season.