NEW YORK — New owner, and now a new star player coming to New Orleans.
And yet another loss — in a historic season full of them — for Michael Jordan and the Charlotte Bobcats.
The Hornets, recently sold by the NBA to Saints owner Tom Benson, won the NBA’s draft lottery Wednesday and the No. 1 pick overall — which they almost certainly will use to pick Kentucky star Anthony Davis.
At least that’s what the consensus college player of the year is expecting. Moments after the Hornets won the lottery, Davis said he was looking forward to playing professionally in the place where he led the Wildcats to a national championship in April.
The Hornets moved up from the fourth spot, where they had a 13.7 percent chance, to earn the pick.
“Everything was surreal once they announced the fourth pick,” said Hornets coach Monty Williams, who represented the team on stage. “I said ‘This is pretty cool.’ I knew my wife and kids were home praying that things would go well and they did.”
The Bobcats, after going 7-59 for the worst winning percentage in NBA history, fell to the No. 2 pick. Washington will pick third and Cleveland fell one spot to fourth.
Charlotte had a 25 percent chance of grabbing the No. 1 pick, but instead will have to take the best player after Davis, possibly his teammate, Michael Kidd-Gilchrist.
The team with the worst record hasn’t won since Orlando drafted Dwight Howard in 2004.
The league bought the Hornets from owner George Shinn in December 2010 and the sale to Benson was completed in April. The NBA was criticized for the conflict of interest of a league owning a franchise, particularly when Commissioner David Stern blocked a trade that would have sent Paul to the Lakers in December, then approved another that landed Paul with the Clippers.
The ownership uncertainty hindered the Hornets, but they were in a celebrating mood Wednesday after earning the No. 1 pick for the first time since 1991, when they were still in Charlotte and took Larry Johnson.
The Hornets, who went 21-45, also have the No. 10 pick. They played hard at the end of the season even as they reduced their lottery odds, winning eight of their final 13 games with a young roster.
Though they didn’t officially say it, it’s expected to start with Davis, one of the most dominant defensive college players in years who was Most Outstanding Player of the Final Four.
The Nets were the other big loser when they stayed in the No. 6 spot. They owed their pick to Portland for this season’s Gerald Wallace trade unless they moved into the top three.