The Quebec Nordiks had the first pick in the draft, selecting Simon Gagne of the NHL's Philadelphia Flyers.
An hour and twenty minutes later, Hull disappeared.
Confused? So were we – all four of us on tap to cover the draft.
Nevertheless, the picks rolled in with the likes of Joe Thornton, Todd Bertuzzi and Eric Lindros becoming WHA property.
At around 5:30pm, the draft ended and 240 NHL and AHL players were picked by the 8 franchises – one yet to be named.
Quebec's top picks included the likes of Gagne, goalies Maxime Ouellet and Marc Denis, center Yanic Perreault and forward Ramzi Abid, who was the last player selected in the draft.
The Halifax IceBreakers took NHL veteran Travis Green second overall, followed by Craig MacDonald and Chris Tamer.
Detroit, picking third, chose Dany Heatley. The Gladiators also picked such notables as Drake Berehowski, Steve and Martin Kariya, Dmitri Yushkevich and Alexander Perezhogin, whom the AHL suspended for a full-season.
Choosing fifth, the Hamilton franchise selected the NHL's leading-rookie scorer Michael Ryder, as well as fellow NHL rookie Trent Hunter, goalie Felix Potvin and the often-storied Theoren Fleury.
The Toronto Toros elected to go with Thornton, merely obtaining his WHA rights, while they also obtained Ilya Kovalchuk, Jonathan Cheechoo and Scott Hartnell.
The Founder's Franchise, which will be announced early next week, picked Bertuzzi, defenseman Jiri Slegr, NHL retirees Doug Gilmour, Kirk Muller and Tommy Albelin, and forward Scott Upshall.
Drafting seventh overall, the Dallas Americans –who took the full 12-minutes issued per team to draft each of its player– took Lindros, Scott Gomez, Ron Hainsey and Todd Harvey.
The last franchise, an unnamed Florida team expected to play in Orlando, drafted Stanley Cup MVP Brad Richards, goalies Steve Shields, Zac Bierk and Jean-Sebastien Aubin, forward Nicholas Dimitrakos and defenseman Bob Boughner, who was recently signed by the Colorado Avalanche.
