At the conclusion of the worst day in Nathan Noel’s life, he and his family threw a party.

Technically, they decided to go through with a party that had already been planned. It wasn’t one being hosted to commemorate Noel’s unforgettably awful day. Just hours earlier, everyone, including Noel, was anticipating a celebratory evening. That day just never went as expected.

The day was June 27, 2015. It was supposed to be the day Noel was drafted into the NHL. Everything was pointing to that. He had talked to multiple NHL teams and got the sense they were interested in selecting him. The draft experts certainly loved his potential. ESPN had him as the 75th best prospect and wrote of him, “Noel has been one of the very best prospects to come out of the eastern provinces in recent years.” He landed at No. 54 among North American skaters on the NHL Central Scouting’s final rankings.

The Noel family based their plans around that information. Noel and his family decided to travel from their home in Newfoundland to attend the draft at the BB&T Center in Sunrise, Florida. They invited friends and family to join them and approximately 30-40 took them up on the invitation. They rented a house in the area and scheduled a party for Saturday evening.

Noel sat with his family and agent Allan Walsh in the arena when the draft’s second day began on Saturday morning. There was a small chance Noel could get selected early in the day, but it was more likely he’d go a little later.

The third round came and went without Noel being chosen. When that happened again in the fourth round, Noel got worried. He turned to his father, Glen Noel, and voiced what had been going on inside his head.

“At that point, he looked at me, we were sitting next each other, and said, ‘I’m not getting drafted today,’” Glen recalled. “I said, ‘What do you mean? After this, we have three more rounds to go.’”

Nathan Noel was drafted by the Blackhawks in the fourth round in 2016. (Aaron Bell/CHL Images)

Noel held out some hope, but it was sucked out of him by the sixth round.

“After like the fourth round, I started seeing names come off that I was kind of iffy about,” said Noel, who turns 20 on June 21. “I was kind of thinking my name is going to come up soon. And by about the sixth round, I knew. I had a feeling. I was kind of close to leaving the draft. I said to my dad, ‘Let’s get out there, I know I’m not going today.’ I looked at the board. There weren’t many teams who I had talked to who had a pick. You got to get a bounce. The draft is the draft; everyone has their list. It was definitely a tough day.”

The Noel family returned to the rented house after the draft. Reality sunk in. The question hanging in the air was, ‘Now what?’

Glen first put his son’s adversity into perspective.

“When his name didn’t get called, we were really taken aback and surprised by it, but we talked about it as a family,” Glen said. “We said we’ve faced adversity before. My dad died when I was only 2 ½ years old. My mom was left a widow with four kids to raise. I was the youngest. That’s adversity. We overcame that. We talked about it as a family and said we could move on from it. We were confident he could prove himself and he did.”

Next up was the scheduled party. Could they really cancel the party after everyone came so far to attend? The Noel family decided the party would go on.

Noel had to fight some mental ninjas that day and would have to do so a few times over the next month, but he held them off. The feeling ate at him and his confidence had been shaken, but he came around, even that night.

“He was really down over it,” Glen said. “Everyone was down. He wanted some time alone. After that time alone, he moved on. We had a real party. He partied with us.

“I never thought he’d give up. I really thought it was a kick in the gut having so many of his teammates drafted and he wasn’t drafted. I was worried how he was going to react. … I actually thought it made him stronger. He saw after the first round he could compete with the guys. He said, ‘You know dad I’m going to prove to people I can compete with all of those players.’”

A chip was firmly planted on Noel’s shoulder. That motivation pushed him throughout the 2015-2016 season with the St. John Sea Dogs of the QMJHL. As a center, he had 21 goals and 36 assists in 61 games. He was a factor in all zones, played with speed and was aggressive.

Nathan Noel participated in his first prospect camp last year. (Scott Powers/The Athletic)

The Blackhawks took notice. He had been discussed by their scouting staff during the 2015 draft, but he was further down their list. Heading into the 2016 draft, they had him higher. And in the fourth round with the No. 113th overall pick, Blackhawks amateur scouting vice president Mark Kelley selected Noel.

“One of things you learn about all these kids is how they handle a little bit of adversity,” Kelley said recently. “I think with Nathan we saw that in the second year we were scouting him for the draft. [What we liked about him] was the tenacity, the way he plays. He attacks. He plays very hard.”

After Kelley announced Noel’s name at the Blackhawks table at the First Niagara Center in Buffalo, New York on June 25, 2016, there was no burst of applause in the arena. That was because Noel and his family weren’t there.

Noel didn’t even think about going to Buffalo. He wasn’t even watching the draft at home while it was going on. He was out playing in a road hockey tournament.

Walsh called him with the news.

“There was conscious decision not to go to the draft,” Walsh said. “I think he chose to go play roller hockey as a way to keep his mind off it, but I’m sure it was still there. He was overcome with emotion. It was a great call to make it. Knowing what he had gone through the year before, it was a great call to make.

“I remember telling Nathan the next morning [after he wasn’t drafted in 2015], I said this isn’t going to be the first time you get knocked on your ass. Everybody’s going to watch now to see how you respond to it. Are you going to take your toys and go home or are you going to go out there and put your nose to the grindstone and keep working? And the credit all belongs to him.”

Undrafted last year, Nathan Noel’s emotional reaction when informed he was drafted 4th round by Chicago this year. pic.twitter.com/APYurAjSyG — Allan Walsh (@walsha) June 26, 2016

Noel never was completely certain he would get drafted that day. He was hopeful, but he had learned his lesson from the year before. When it actually happened, he understood the significance. He also isn’t ever going to forget what happened in 2015. Both experiences shape him now.

“I was very gratified,” Noel said of being drafted. “That my break. That was my break in hockey.

“[Not being drafted in 2015] was obviously the worst day of my life. It turned out to be maybe the best because I ended up getting that opportunity with the Blackhawks. But for sure, it was a terrible day to be there with all my family there. It was a tough pill to swallow. It was good I could bounce back from that. I wouldn’t wish that on anyone to go to the draft and not go.”

Noel has continued to use that to drive him. He had 24 goals and 26 assists in 52 games and played a role in the Sea Dogs winning the QMJHL’s President’s Cup and earning a trip to the Memorial Cup this past season. The Blackhawks saw enough from Noel to offer him an entry-level contract, and he’ll join their roster pool next season.

Noel has now set his sights on the NHL, but it’s still that same chip propelling him.

“I think moving forward I’m going to surprise a lot of people because of my past history,” said Noel, who likes to model his game after Andrew Shaw.“I just want to be one of the great fourth-rounders. That’s my goal. I want to show I deserve to be there. I deserve to be drafted that year. I deserve everything that I get. I want to keep striving every day.”

In the end, Noel and his family did get to celebrate him being drafted. While Noel was playing roller hockey, Noel’s parents, Glen and Nadine, were watching the draft at home and received the news. They quickly went to meet Noel and their daughter, Natasha, who was also competing in the road hockey tournament.

Once there, the four family members got together. Their celebration wasn’t as elaborate as what they had put together in 2015, but there on the street, it was more meaningful.

“We had a group hug and a group cry,” Glen said. “We met up with some friends. It was just going around. Smaller kids were coming up to him. Word was going around.”

(Top photo: Aaron Bell/CHL Images)