Bryan Colangelo, general manager of the Toronto Raptors, attends the 2011 NBA basketball draft lottery, Tuesday, May 17, 2011 in Secaucus, N.J.Julio Cortez/The Associated Press
This time around, a trip to New Jersey didn't have the desired outcome for the Toronto Raptors.
The NBA team headed into the draft lottery in Secaucus on Tuesday with the third pick overall provisionally and, after the ping-pong balls had dropped, they had fallen to fifth.
The last time Raptors general manager Bryan Colangelo was present at the lottery was in 2006, his first season running the Raptors, when Toronto came in with the No. 5 pick and wound up winning the top selection, which they used to pick Andrea Bargnani.
This year, the big winners were the Cleveland Cavaliers, who came into the lottery with the second-best chance of securing the No. 1 pick at 19.9 per cent.
And the team that walked off with the big lottery prize in 2003 that turned into LeBron James was celebrating once again after winning the coveted No. 1 pick for the 2011 draft, which will be held in June.
The Cavaliers also moved up to secure the fourth overall pick in the draft.
The Minnesota Timberwolves, which had the best odds (25 per cent) at holding on to the top pick, fell to No. 2 while the Utah Jazz turned the New Jersey Nets' pick from the Deron Williams trade into the No. 3 selection.
The Raptors entered the lottery with a 15.6-per-cent chance of moving up and landing the top pick.
But luck wasn't with Colangelo, who had to maintain a brave face after seeing his squad dropping two slots into fifth for the draft.
This isn't the deepest of drafts and Colangelo has said he considers Duke freshman point guard Kyrie Irving and Arizona sophomore forward Derrick Williams as the top two prospects.
Colangelo said with those two players now likely out of the mix he doesn't believe dropping back from third to fifth will pose too much of a problem for his team.
"Number three, number four, number five - I'm not sure there's a lot of difference there," he said. "The beauty is in the eye of the beholder in this situation."
Colangelo said there will be a handful of draft prospects whom the Raptors will be able to seriously look at to try to fill their needs, mentioning players such as point guard Brandon Knight from Kentucky and Kemba Walker from Connecticut, and big men Enes Kanter from Kentucky and Jonas Valanciunas from Lithuania.
Richard Peddie is the outgoing chief executive officer of Raptors owner Maple Leaf Sports & Entertainment Ltd., whose basketball and hockey teams each missed the postseason this season.
Peddie said he met with Colangelo before he left for New Jersey to discuss strategy.
More specifically, Peddie wanted to ascertain whether the GM was going armed with a good luck charm as has been the practice of other team representatives at the lottery.
"Last time he was there Bryan told me he was the only guy in the room who didn't have one," Peddie said. "He did tell me though that he was staying in the same hotel. Bryan's not near as bad as the hockey guys when it comes to good luck charms."
This year's draft is viewed as anything but stellar with many candidates choosing to remain in school with the threat of a labour shutdown looming this summer.