It’s been a reasonably strong season so far for the Blackhawks, who have shown signs of life as they come out of the rebuild of the past few years and aim to get back in contention. Some of their biggest pieces haven’t fully developed yet, so the team isn’t planning on having any postseason success, but Chicago finds itself within 10 points of a wild-card spot as we enter the Olympic break. They’ve been struggling as of late, losing six of their last seven, which is good all the same–they’re now improving their odds of landing the top pick in the 2026 draft, which could be Gavin McKenna, the phenom loosely related to Connor Bedard. They currently find themselves with the sixth-fewest points in the NHL.
For the past year or so, it’s seemed that the Blackhawks could be headed for an exciting summer in 2026. As a result of their trading Seth Jones last March for Spencer Knight, they picked up the first-round pick of the Panthers this year. That seemed significant, because with Florida suffering a number of significant injuries like Aleksander Barkov and Jones himself, they’ve also struggled this season and currently find themselves 22nd in the league. The Blackhawks could get ahold of two top-ten picks this summer, right?
Wrong. On Friday morning, Frank Seravalli tweeted the top of the 2026 NHL Draft Lottery odds, including the Panthers in 10th, and noted that the pick was top-ten protected. But previously, nobody anywhere had reported any protection of that sort. The only protection that was mentioned was that as long as Florida owned its first-round pick in 2026 when the 2025 NHL Draft began, it went to the Blackhawks.
The Blackhawks confirmed later today that the first-rounder is indeed protected if it’s in the top 10. If so, Chicago would take their 2027 first-round pick with unprotected status. The Bruins currently own Florida’s first-rounder for next year, which would slide to 2028 if that’s the case. The extra detail of the trade wasn’t reported anywhere, but the Blackhawks’ front office was aware of it all along.
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It suddenly becomes much more complicated to root for the Panthers to get the 11th overall pick in this year’s draft than to simply root for them to finish as low in the standings as possible. The Blackhawks would certainly prefer the 2026 pick to the 2027 unprotected one. Florida will be much closer to full-strength next season and should return to the top of the standings.
Chicago could certainly use the extra first-rounder, but just getting Knight in the trade made it worth it. The Panthers won a Stanley Cup with Jones, but Knight appears to be the goaltender of the future for the Blackhawks. Anything else is just icing on the cake.
