Draft lottery a win-win for the Buffalo Sabres

Buffalo is home to the NHL's worst team and NBC/NBC Sports Network's best ratings. Saturday the twain shall meet when NBC airs the NHL draft lottery at 8 p.m. ET — and for one giddy moment, hockey-crazed Buffalo will care more about ping pong than pucks.

That's because, depending on how the pinging, ponging balls fall, the Buffalo Sabres will have first or second choice in June's NHL draft, where a pair of generational talents, Connor McDavid and Jack Eichel, are up for grabs. That means the Sabres can't lose. And when is the last time you could say that?

McDavid plays for the Erie (Pa.) Otters of the Ontario Hockey League, Eichel for Boston University. Both are 18. Both are centers. And NHL Central Scouting director Dan Marr sees each as a can't-miss star.

"When you pick one or two in this draft," Marr tells USA TODAY Sports, "you are winning a prize."

That's how Sabres general manager Tim Murray sees it, too.

"Potentially, yes," he says. "They're both very good prospects. I've seen both guys quite a few times. They both play a high-paced game. They play with speed, they play with skill and they play with sense. Both guys should be top-end NHL players."

The lottery affords all 14 teams that missed the Stanley Cup playoffs a chance at the top pick, on a sliding scale from the Sabres (20% chance) and Arizona Coyotes (13.5%) to the Los Angeles Kings (2%) and Boston Bruins (1%). If the Sabres do not win top choice, they automatically get second. Murray declines to say which star he'd take if given the choice, though NHL Central Scouting ranks McDavid as the top prospect and Eichel No. 2.

"To us, there is a distinct line, but it is a fine line," Marr says. "Jack is a powerful skater. Connor has speed. I don't know if he is as powerful of a skater, but he has the quickness. When you combine how he processes the game and executes, his quickness is just a notch above where Jack is at. That's the only difference we can identify.

"Connor is a tad younger, and he weighs 195, but he's going to get stronger. I think Jack has a better size-strength game because he is more physically mature. They are both going to be productive, impactful players for a long time. I think Connor will be viewed as more of a high-skill finesse guy. And Jack will be seen as a power-skill guy."

Both sound good to Arizona general manager Don Maloney, who praises McDavid as "the real deal" and Eichel as "All-Star level." Maloney's Coyotes had the second-worst record in the NHL this season and have the second-best shot at the top pick but a two-in-three chance of picking third. Maloney, mixing metaphors, calls it "a home run" if the Coyotes get first or second choice. "If we don't," he says, "there's still terrific players available."

Maloney thinks any of a half-dozen players could be the No. 3 pick. NHL Central Scouting ranks the next-best potential draftees as Boston College defenseman Noah Hanifin, Erie center Dylan Strome and Kingston (Ont.) left winger Lawson Crouse.

"There might be a player or two in that next group that turns out to be better or at least on par" in the long run, Maloney says. "But right now, it's clear to everybody that's seen any of these prospects play that those two are a head above, and it's particularly the position — center ice — is so hard to find. You get a No. 1 center ice, potential franchise center staring you in the face, that's pretty attractive."

McDavid racked up 120 points in 47 games and his Otters will play in the Western Conference finals of the OHL playoffs. Eichel won the Hobey Baker award as college hockey's best player and his BU Terriers finished second in the NCAA tournament.

"It doesn't matter where good players play, they are going to stick out like a sore thumb," Marr says. "You could have switched them. Connor would have had the same impact at the NCAA and Jack would have made the same impact in the OHL. You can't say that for a lot of players."

Surely Murray feels good knowing he'll get one or the other. He chuckles at that notion.

"Well, it always feels good when you know you're going to end up with a good player," Murray says. "But good players come from many different places, as we know. Not a whole lot can make a year like this make you feel great, but certainly we know that these two guys are going to make any organization better and certainly one of them is going to be a piece of the puzzle that makes the Buffalo Sabres better."

Murray speaks with a modicum of restraint. Sabres fans do not. Some of them rooted openly for their team to lose in the season's later stages. "I've heard about that, yeah," Murray says, "but I can't say too much to that, I don't think."

Sabres fans also rooted for the Coyotes to win during the race to the bottom. When The Buffalo News ran a story on an Arizona loss last week, one commenter on The News website confessed: "My wife thinks I'm looking at improper things late at night on the computer but it's actually something way worse. It's Coyotes hockey games."

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Now that last place is Buffalo's, so is McEichel — the hybrid name by which fans have come to know the combined talents of the Canadian-born McDavid and American-born Eichel. Cole's, an oaky Buffalo bar, offered $15 McEichel burgers this season — with American cheese and Canadian cheddar, topped with maple-syrup candied bacon and Canadian bacon, served with poutine fries and Maple Leaf envy.

"It's been a tough season, rooting against your own team," Cole's co-owner Mike Shatzel says. "But in the long run we'll forget about all that because we'll have one of those guys."

And so Saturday Buffalo will be awash in viewing parties, like the one at Cole's, where there'll be a special on Canadian beer if the bingo balls give the Sabres top pick — and on domestic beer if they slip to second. The Amherst Ale House will offer specialty drinks — a $4.97 McDavid made with orange vodka and a $4.09 Eichel with cherry vodka — although, a promotional flier cautions, even if you order the McDavid drink, chances are 80% you'll wind up with the Eichel instead.

Contributing: Sarah McLellan, Arizona Republic