![\"Maple](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/GettyImages-2245915041-e1779754856256.jpg\")
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William Nylander and Matthew Knies of the Toronto Maple Leafs<\/a> shared a video of their shocked reaction to the team winning the draft lottery.<\/p>\n The Maple Leafs finished with the fifth-worst record in the NHL this season and had a 8.5% chance of winning the lottery<\/a>. The hockey gods were looking down upon the Leafs as they shocked the hockey world and won the first-overall pick, with which they are expected to take Penn State University star winger Gavin McKenna in June\u2019s NHL Entry Draft<\/a>.<\/p>\n It turns out that not only were Leafs fans surprised by the good news, but so were the team\u2019s star players.<\/p>\n Watch the Video of William Nylander and Matthew Knies\u2019s Reaction to the Lottery Win<\/p>\n In a video posted on Nylander\u2019s YouTube<\/a> channel, the Swedish superstar shared a video of his shocked reaction along with his teammate, Knies, when the Leafs won the lottery. At first, the two players thought they were being trolled when they heard the news, before realizing it was actually happening.<\/p>\n \u201cWe won the draft lottery,\u201d Nylander said. \u201cAre you (expletive kidding me?\u201d<\/p>\n After Nylander and Knies checked the NHL official website to make sure they weren\u2019t being trolled, they both exploded into happiness.<\/p>\n \u201cOh, my God. That\u2019s crazy, that\u2019s insane, that\u2019s wild, that\u2019s sick!\u201d Nylander said.<\/p>\n It\u2019s a great video of two of Toronto\u2019s best players being happy about the team winning the first overall pick, as they both know that winning the lottery can change the fortune of the entire Maple Leafs franchise after they had such a bad season, when they missed out on the playoffs for the first time in a decade.<\/p>\n Matthew Knies and William Nylander were at a loss for words after finding out the Leafs got the number 1 overall pick while at the Marlies game.<\/p>\n (via: YT\/William Nylander) <\/p>\n Maple Leafs Have Big Moves to Make<\/p>\n New Leafs general manager John Chayka has plenty of big moves to make this offseason, and it starts with getting a new head coach<\/a>. The Leafs are said to be interested in interviewing between 30 and 40 candidates for the job, as Chayka promised he would cast a wide net and find the right person for the job. There is no rush to hire anyone just yet, although the Leafs would love to have someone in place before the NHL draft in late June.<\/p>\n Chayka also needs to convince team captain Auston Matthews that this Leafs team is the right squad for him to play with after they had a down year. Rumors have come out of Toronto that Matthews has doubts about the future of the franchise<\/a> after they had such an awful year, but after hiring Chayka as the GM and team legend Mats Sundin as a senior advisor, plus winning the draft lottery, things are suddenly looking up for this Maple Leafs team.<\/p>\n As well, Chayka is going to need to make changes to the roster. There are heavy rumors that longtime defenseman Morgan Rielly may be on his way out, and Max Domi has some health issues that may prevent him from being ready for the start of the season<\/a>. So Chayka is going to be plenty busy this offseason as he prepares to retool the Maple Leafs and get them back into the playoff mix next year.<\/p>\n \n\t\t\tAdam Martin<\/a> Adam Martin is a sports journalist with over 15 years of experience. He has a speciality in MMA, while also covering the Big 4 Sports. Adam is currently a contributor to Heavy.com, with previous experience working for The Toronto Star, Sportsnet, theScore, Bookies, BJPenn.com, and MMAOddsbreaker.com. More about Adam Martin<\/a>\t\t<\/p>\n \n\t\t\tMore Heavy on Maple Leafs\n\t\t<\/p>\n \n\t\t\t\tLoading more stories\n\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"William Nylander and Matthew Knies of the Toronto Maple Leafs shared a video of their shocked reaction to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":694762,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[556],"tags":[64,63,575,85],"class_list":["post-694761","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-nhl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/694761","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=694761"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/694761\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/694762"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=694761"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=694761"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=694761"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}