Cooper Flagg #2 of the Duke Blue Devils reacts towards the Houston Cougars throughout the first half within the Last 4 recreation of the NCAA Males’s Basketball Match on the Alamodome on April 05, 2025 in San Antonio, Texas. Jamie Squire/Getty Photos/AFP
Someday round 6 p.m. EDT Monday, locked inside a safe room with no approach of speaking with the skin world, crew executives and others will watch 14 ping-pong balls begin to bounce inside a machine.
The balls will likely be numbered, 1 by 14. One will likely be drawn, then a second, then a 3rd, then a fourth. And with that, the folks inside that room will discover out, an hour or so earlier than the remainder of the world, which crew gained the No. 1 choose subsequent month within the NBA draft.
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The NBA draft lottery is Monday evening in Chicago, with the winner getting the prospect to choose No. 1 general. And which means Duke’s Cooper Flagg — the seemingly No. 1 choose — could have a superb probability of realizing which metropolis he’ll be calling residence subsequent season as quickly because the lottery outcomes are introduced.
No one contained in the room the place the outcomes are revealed on a televised broadcast will know who gained the lottery till deputy commissioner Mark Tatum makes the precise announcement. These contained in the room stay there, with out their telephones, till that point.
The race for No. 1
There are 13 groups with an opportunity to win the No. 1 choose. Utah, Washington and Charlotte have one of the best odds, 14% every.
New Orleans has a 12.5% probability, Philadelphia a ten.5% probability, Brooklyn a 9% probability, Toronto a 7.5% probability and San Antonio a 6.7% probability.
After that, it’s Houston (3.8%), Portland (3.7%), Dallas (1.8%), Chicago (1.7%) and Sacramento (0.8%).
READ: Spurs win NBA draft lottery; Wembanyama on the way in which
The rationale there are 14 lottery spots however solely 13 groups with an opportunity to win the No. 1 choose is as a result of Atlanta’s odds convey to San Antonio, basically that means the Spurs are within the lottery twice — with a 6% probability of successful on their very own, and an 0.7% probability to win with the Hawks’ combos of ping-pong balls.
This technique has been in place since 2019, the newest effort to discourage tanking — the apply the place groups aren’t overly inquisitive about successful common season video games with hopes as an alternative of bettering their probabilities of successful the No. 1 draft choose.
The groups with the three worst information all have the identical probability — 14% — of successful the No. 1 choose, and odds for the remaining lottery groups are step by step diminished from there.
The place groups can end
Utah can’t end under fifth, Washington can’t end under sixth, Charlotte can’t end under seventh and New Orleans can’t end under eighth.
Philadelphia would hold the choose ought to it land within the prime six; every other outcome — solely seventh, eighth or ninth could be potential at that time — would ship the choose to Oklahoma Metropolis.
READ: Duke’s Cooper Flagg is greatest star heading into March Insanity
Brooklyn, Toronto, San Antonio, Houston, Portland, Dallas, Chicago and Sacramento all might transfer up into the highest 4 as nicely. They’d all must buck lengthy odds — and in some instances, actually lengthy odds — for that to occur. Brooklyn has a 37% probability of getting there; Sacramento solely has a couple of 4% probability.
The remainder of the draft order
The lottery solely units the order for the primary 14 picks within the draft. The remainder of the first-round — picks 15-30 — had been decided by regular-season end, although a few of these picks have been traded many occasions through the years.
The remainder of the first-round order, for now, is: Oklahoma Metropolis picks No. 15, Orlando No. 16, Minnesota No. 17, Washington No. 18, Brooklyn No. 19 and Miami No. 20.
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From there, the ultimate 10 picks within the first spherical are owned by Utah (21), Atlanta (22), Indiana (23), Oklahoma Metropolis (24), Orlando (25), Brooklyn (26 and 27), Boston (28), Phoenix (29) and the Los Angeles Clippers (30).