NBA Lottery 2015: Odds for First Pick and Viewing Info for Draft Showcase

The 2015 NBA draft lottery will take place on Tuesday night to determine the order for the first 14 selections in this year's draft. The ping-pong ball process is used for each of the first three picks with the non-winners then slotting in by record.

ESPN will broadcast the annual revealing of the draft order starting at 8:30 p.m. ET. A live stream of the festivities is available through WatchESPN. It's immediately followed by Game 1 of the Western Conference Finals between the Houston Rockets and Golden State Warriors.

Here are each lottery team's odds for winning the top overall pick:

Rank	Team	% Chance
1	Minnesota Timberwolves	25
2	New York Knicks	19.9
3	Philadelphia 76ers	15.6
4	Los Angeles Lakers	11.9
5	Orlando Magic	8.8
6	Sacramento Kings	6.3
7	Denver Nuggets	4.3
8	Detroit Pistons	2.8
9	Charlotte Hornets	1.7
10	Miami Heat	1.1
11	Indiana Pacers	0.8
12	Utah Jazz	0.7
13	Phoenix Suns	0.6
14	Oklahoma City Thunder	0.5

NBA.com notes there are 1,001 different combinations of four-number outcomes when the process begins. One ball will be drawn at a time, and once four have been removed from the machine, the winning team will be decided.

Then the process is repeated two more times in order to figure out which teams will draft second and third, respectively. If the same team is drawn twice, then they will redo the draw until a combination equates to a new franchise.

After the top three are set, every other team falls into place behind them.

Al Iannazzone of Newsday passed along comments from New York Knicks team president Phil Jackson, who unsurprisingly took a zen approach to it all.

"There are all these numbers out there that are kind of unusual," Jackson said. "So it's a real crapshoot. There's no doubt about it. ... We feel like it's a lottery like anything else, and we'll just go in there with a positive attitude and take what comes out of that lottery."

ESPN Stats and Info points out having the best odds hasn't translated to lottery wins:

Karl-Anthony Towns, Jahlil Okafor, D'Angelo Russell and Emmanuel Mudiay seem to have separated from the pack as the top four prospects in the class. Those are the names most front offices around the league are daydreaming about in the hours leading up to the lottery.

Towns and Okafor are both centers, albeit with different skills sets, while Russell and Mudiay are guards. So the lottery will not only determine which team goes first but could also have a major impact on the order that quartet comes off the board.

The draft picture will become far more clear on Tuesday night.