Could the Islanders trade the first overall pick?

On Monday night, the right ping pong ball popped up, with the New York Islanders 2025 NHL Draft Lottery and being awarded the No. 1 overall pick in this year’s draft.

The Islanders went from having the 10th-best odds (3.5%) to getting the opportunity to draft first this summer. This is the third the Isles have won the lottery. In 2000, they infamously picked goaltender Rick DiPietro. In 2009, they drafted former captain John Tavares.

On Tuesday’s episode of Daily Faceoff LIVE, Frank Seravalli and Tyler Yaremchuk are joined by DFO Prospect Analyst Steven Ellis for another edition of the Next Wave. They discuss potential movement in the draft and if the Islanders would trade away their No. 1 overall pick.

Tyler Yaremchuk: It’s a fantasy GM exercise to talk about trading down or moving a pick. When you look at the teams in the top five, are there any teams that based at where they’re at in the process, whether they’re trending down or trending up, that you look and think maybe it does make sense to get something to help now and slide down in the first round?

Steven Ellis: Maybe it’s the Islanders. They’ve got house money here, since they were a team that wasn’t projected to pick in the top five, so they’re going to get a significantly better prospect. The San Jose Sharks and the Chicago Blackhawks are two teams that are probably going to want to take steps forward, so maybe they move up? But I doubt it. We just don’t see trades this high up in the draft, it’s such a rare thing. People think it happens a lot more than it does.

If I’m the Islanders, you can draft sixth, seventh or eighth and you’re still getting an upgrade over what you thought you were getting. That could be a situation where teams like the Philadelphia have three first rounders, Nashville has a lot of high picks, do they move up?

I’m still thinking no one moves, but the Islanders are an interesting one.

You can watch the full segment and the rest of the episode here…