Nba Draft Lottery Winners And Losers: Wizards Earn Top Pick, Trade Dooms Pacers

NBA Draft Lottery winners and losers: Wizards earn top pick, trade dooms Pacers originally appeared on NBC Sports Philadelphia

The Washington Wizards are officially on the clock.

The NBA’s worst team this season was rewarded with some lottery luck on Sunday, winning the top pick in a loaded draft.

The Utah Jazz, Memphis Grizzlies and Chicago Bulls filled out the top-four picks, in that order. Now, it’s time to start scouring mock drafts and studying some of the top players in this potentially historic class.

Here are some winners and losers from the lottery:

Winner: Wizards

Starting with the obvious, winning the lottery is monumental for the Wizards.

The team has won fewer than 20 games in three straight seasons, but lottery luck hasn’t given them the first overall pick since 2010. John Wall, who was their representative at Sunday’s drawing, was the pick that year. Washington, in 2025, fell from second to sixth, where it selected Tre Johnson.

There isn’t an obvious No. 1 player in this class, but that’s only due to the glut of talent at the top. BYU forward AJ Dybantsa projects as a potential pick, but you could make the argument for Kansas guard Darryn Peterson, Duke forward Cameron Boozer or North Carolina forward Caleb Wilson. For a roster that just added Trae Young and Anthony Davis in mid-season trades, perhaps a wing talent like Dybantsa is the pick.

Loser: Nets

Lottery luck hasn’t been on Brooklyn’s side recently.

Last year, the Nets dropped from sixth to eighth. This year, they fell from third to sixth. These results come after years of surrendering their own first-round picks to teams like the Celtics and Rockets — where they picked players like Jayson Tatum, Jaylen Brown and Reed Sheppard.

The Nets can still add talent at No. 6, but they will miss out on the top-four talent that seems to be on another tier. Arkansas guard Darius Acuff, Houston guard Kingston Flemings, Illinois guard Keaton Wagler and Arizona guard Brayden Burries could be options for Brooklyn.

Winner: Trades shake up the order

Four trades were revisited during this lottery, with the results impacting the Pacers, Clippers, Pelicans, Hawks, Bucks and Thunder.

The Pacers-Clippers trade this season involving Ivica Zubac meant that Indiana kept its pick if it was top-four, or else it went to LA. Well, it was fifth — so the Clippers now have a premium pick after losing in the Play-In Tournament. The reigning Eastern Conference champions, meanwhile, have nothing to show for their 19-win campaign — although they will get Tyrese Haliburton back from injury next season.

The Pelicans gave up their unprotected first-rounder to the Hawks last year during the draft, but the Hawks could also swap picks with the Bucks if Milwaukee’s pick jumped over New Orleans’. Neither pick moved into the top four, so the Hawks will take the Pelicans’ No. 8 pick and the Bucks will keep their No. 10 pick.

The Thunder, who are rolling through the playoffs and seem poised to win consecutive titles, own the Clippers’ unprotected first from the trade that also gave them reigning (and potentially repeat) MVP winner Shai Gilgeous-Alexander. For the rest of the NBA, it was a sigh of relief that their pick stayed put at No. 12.

Winner AND loser: Tanking

It was tough to watch for most of the season, but fans of many bad teams were rewarded Sunday. Others, not so much.

The Wizards had the worst record in the NBA, blatantly resting Young and Davis and letting their young talent play extended minutes. The Jazz and Grizzlies had a similar strategy, with Lauri Markkanen, Jaren Jackson Jr. and Ja Morant missing time and both teams opting for development over victories in 2025-26.

Other teams that tanked weren’t as lucky. The aforementioned Pacers and Nets fell just outside of the top-four despite their year-long losing effort. The Kings dropped from fifth to seventh despite going 22-60, which was their worst record since 2008-09.

The good and the bad of tanking were on full display Sunday, and it’s unclear how these results will impact the NBA’s potential plans to revamp the lottery odds moving forward.