Somewhere behind locked doors in Chicago, as the ping-pong balls start to dance and dreams hang in the balance, the San Antonio Spurs will quietly hope history repeats itself.

With just a 6.7% chance at landing the top pick in Monday night’s NBA Draft Lottery, the odds aren’t exactly stacked in their favor — but if there’s one franchise that knows how to beat the bounce, it’s San Antonio. The Spurs have already struck lottery gold three times, turning No. 1 overall picks into generational icons: David Robinson in 1987, Tim Duncan in 1997, and most recently, Victor Wembanyama in 2023.

Now, with phenom Cooper Flagg projected to go first overall, San Antonio is once again in the mix — quietly dangerous, historically lucky, and always prepared to build greatness from the top down.

Could the ping-pong gods smile on the Spurs one more time? If history’s any guide, don’t count them out.

The race for No. 1

There are 13 teams with a chance to win the No. 1 pick. Utah, Washington and Charlotte have the best odds, 14% each.

New Orleans has a 12.5% chance, Philadelphia a 10.5% chance, Brooklyn a 9% chance, Toronto a 7.5% chance and San Antonio a 6.7% chance.

After that, it’s Houston (3.8%), Portland (3.7%), Dallas (1.8%), Chicago (1.7%) and Sacramento (0.8%).

The reason there are 14 lottery spots but only 13 teams with a chance to win the No. 1 pick is because Atlanta’s odds convey to San Antonio, essentially meaning the Spurs are in the lottery twice — with a 6% chance of winning on their own, and an 0.7% chance to win with the Hawks’ combinations of ping-pong balls.

This system has been in place since 2019, the latest effort to discourage tanking — the practice where teams aren’t overly interested in winning regular season games with hopes instead of bettering their chances of winning the No. 1 draft pick.

The teams with the three worst records all have the same chance — 14% — of winning the No. 1 pick, and odds for the remaining lottery teams are gradually reduced from there.

Where teams can finish

Utah can’t finish below fifth, Washington can’t finish below sixth, Charlotte can’t finish below seventh and New Orleans can’t finish below eighth.

Philadelphia would keep the pick should it land in the top six; any other result — only seventh, eighth or ninth would be possible at that point — would send the pick to Oklahoma City.

Brooklyn, Toronto, San Antonio, Houston, Portland, Dallas, Chicago and Sacramento all could move up into the top four as well. They would all have to buck long odds — and in some cases, really long odds — for that to happen. Brooklyn has a 37% chance of getting there; Sacramento only has about a 4% chance.

The rest of the draft order

The lottery only sets the order for the first 14 picks in the draft. The rest of the first-round — picks 15-30 — were determined by regular-season finish, though some of these picks have been traded many times over the years.

The rest of the first-round order, for now, is: Oklahoma City picks No. 15, Orlando No. 16, Minnesota No. 17, Washington No. 18, Brooklyn No. 19 and Miami No. 20.

From there, the final 10 picks in the first round are owned by Utah (21), Atlanta (22), Indiana (23), Oklahoma City (24), Orlando (25), Brooklyn (26 and 27), Boston (28), Phoenix (29) and the Los Angeles Clippers (30).

The 2025 NBA Draft Lottery takes place at 6 p.m. Central tonight.