Well, folks, in the end, it wasn't the team with the best odds—the Anaheim Ducks at 25.5 percent—to win the Connor Bedard sweepstakes with the first overall pick of the 2023 draft.

The Chicago Blackhawks, the team with the third-greatest likelihood of winning the No. 1 pick at 11.5 percent, won the draft lottery and will get the first crack at the generational 17-year-old.

This will be the second time in franchise history the Blackhawks get the top selection in the NHL draft. Last time, you might recall, was 2007 when they picked Patrick Kane after an even wilder No. 5 to No. 1 jump.

Could Bedard take the Blackhawks where Kane once did? What are the implications for the Ducks, the Blue Jackets and the other teams that just missed out on him? And what does this mean for the rest of the league?

We present to you the biggest winners and losers of the 2023 NHL Draft Lottery.

Winner: Kyle Davidson

Young Blackhawks GM Kyle Davidson's shocked expression as Bill Daly revealed the Blackhawks won the lottery over the heavily favorited Ducks said it all.

"I'm feeling a little bit stunned, to be honest. We have staff in the next room I heard go nuts," the 34-year-old said, still perplexed, on the ESPN broadcast. "I'm a little bit speechless, to be honest."

Breaking news, world: Tanking often works in the NHL, whether we like it or not. It isn't foolproof—the Sabres in recent years come to mind—but it generally yields quicker success than maintaining a middling roster (Looking at you, Nashville).

The Blackhawks weren't shy about their intentions since the start of the 2021-22 season, aggressively gutting the roster. Trading away franchise legend Patrick Kane was the icing on the Bedard cake at the 2023 deadline. Although the Blackhawks didn't lose enough this season to be the last-place team in the league, Davidson did enough of a teardown to ensure they ended up in the bottom three.

He had many tough decisions to make when he took over as Blackhawks GM, and some were unpopular, like trading away Alex DeBrincat at last year's draft.

Nevertheless, whatever you feel about tanking, the Blackhawks winning the Bedard sweepstakes will reflect positively on his legacy. He'll always be associated with Bedard now, and he deserves at least a tip of the hat for going all-in to get him—even if luck (or, again, whatever you want to call it) played an even bigger role.

Oh, and according to CapFriendly, the Blackhawks currently have over $41 million in projected cap space for 2023-24 heading into the offseason. Although Davidson is adamant about not rushing the rebuild, you have to wonder what he can do with all that cap space to build around Bedard.

There's a case to be made—and some have argued passionately after the draft lottery result—that the Blackhawks shouldn't have been even in the position to win the lottery after the franchise's negligence surrounding the Kyle Beach sexual assault case.

In December 2021, the Blackhawks settled a lawsuit with Beach after the former player said the team failed to act after he informed them that he was sexually assaulted by former video coach Brad Aldrich.

But the league didn't penalize Chicago when it came to the draft.

Among the fallout, though, was the resignation of former general manager Stan Bowman and the promotion of Davidson from assistant general manager. Now, after plenty of bad days to be Kyle Davidson in his Blackhawks tenure, this certainly wasn't one of them.

Losers: Anaheim and Columbus

Every team that missed out on Bedard is disappointed, but the Ducks and Blue Jackets were so close.

Recency bias is real, but the 2022-23 Anaheim Ducks are at least in the conversation for the worst singular seasons in NHL history.

They were getting cooked night in and night out and had a minus-100 goal differential at one point. It was tough to watch—much tougher to watch than many of the Blackhawks' showings.

It's more painful when you consider the Ducks finished second to the Penguins in the 2005 NHL draft lottery when some young kid named Sidney Crosby was going to go first overall.

Then you had the Columbus Blue Jackets, riddled with injuries throughout a season that was overly hyped due to the surprise Johnny Gaudreau signing. The fact that Columbus fell from second to third is just another blow to a team that had terrible luck last season. The blunder with the announcement that the Blue Jackets had fallen to No. 3 on the broadcast added insult to injury (no pun intended, of course, the Blue Jackets have seen enough of them).

That said, it isn't the end of the world for either of these franchises to pick second and third in the 2023 draft. Adam Fantilli, Leo Carlsson, Will Smith and Matvei Michkov are all available, and each one of these players could immediately make an impact at the NHL level. Plus, as Davidson kept saying, not one player is going to change the entire complexion of a team upon his arrival. Just ask Connor McDavid how that works out.

Winners: The National Hockey League

I'm sorry, and I do enjoy the conspiracy theories, but you'll never convince me the NHL draft lottery is actually rigged. You can't blame Commissioner Gary Bettman for the confusion during the broadcast, and, for what it's worth, there's proof of the ping-pong balls falling in Chicago's favor (see above).

That said, the draft lottery has seemingly shaken out in favor of bigger markets in recent years (Toronto in 2016 and New York in 2020). You've seen it already with Chicago and Kane in 2007, and now the Blackhawks have won the 2023 lottery after having the third-best chance to do so.

Ben Pope of the Chicago Sun Times reported the Blackhawks have already sold $2.5 million worth of season-ticket plans for 2023-24 in the 1.5 hours since winning the No. 1 pick, including more than 500 brand new full-season plans.

Money talks, and the NHL is already making out well with the surprising turn of events.

Losers: The Rest of the Western Conference

Folks, yet potential megastar is about to join the Western Conference.

Between Connor McDavid, Leon Draisaitl, Nathan MacKinnon and Cale Makar, the wild, wild West was already stacked with some of the best individual talents in the league and then some.

Now they've got Bedard, who will be on the way to add even more competition.

The Blackhawks have a terrible roster right now, and Davidson needs to get on that if he truly wants to put Bedard in a position to succeed. He is touted as the best NHL prospect since McDavid, but you never want to make a young star center enter the league without at least one elite winger who can hang with him.

But, if he's anything like McDavid, it won't take long for Chicago to get back in contention, something other Western Confidence must be dreading, along with hearing "Chelsea Dagger" at the United Center again.

The West just got more superstar power, and if these playoffs have been any indication, you've gotta start staying up a little later to watch these teams. It's worth it.

Winner: The Idea of a Storybook Reunion

There are a number of able-bodied veteran free agents who might take a discount to play alongside Bedard. What about a free-agent winger who knows all about playing in the Windy City? Patrick Kane, perhaps?

Kane had mild success in his few months with the Rangers after he strayed from Chicago for the first time, but New York's season ended In spectacular failure in the first round. Kane wasn't solely—or even in the top three reasons—to blame for the Rangers' blown 2-0 series lead to the Devils, but he certainly isn't the player he once was. Nevertheless, even a compromised Kane showed he could deliver moments of brilliance every so often.

Riding out the rest of your career alongside a talent like Bedard in the city you spent all but half of one season of your NHL career wouldn't be the worst-case scenario. Both parties have to at least be thinking about it.

If not Kane, you wonder who Davidson might have his eye on and what it would say about the direction of this team. Davidson was gifted Bedard; what he does next with the cap space and free agents available will truly begin his legacy.