Greg Wyshynski, ESPNDec 17, 2024, 07:00 AM ET
CloseGreg Wyshynski is ESPN’s senior NHL writer.
The NHL playoff picture has started to come into focus.
Some teams have banked enough points to scorching starts that they’re practically locks to make the Stanley Cup Playoffs. Some teams have made up significant ground despite early-season struggles. And some teams are looking for something, anything to give them hope that the season isn’t lost.
Remember: What’s projected now isn’t always how things turn out. On Dec. 17, 2023, the Edmonton Oilers were two points out of a playoff spot. They ended up second in the Pacific and one win away from winning the Stanley Cup. Of course, having Connor McDavid on your team helps.
Welcome to a new monthly feature on ESPN: The NHL Bubble Watch, where we check in with the postseason races using playoff probabilities and points projections from Stathletes for all 32 teams – including what each team should be most concerned about going forward … or in the case of some lottery-bound teams, what they should celebrate.
But first, a look at what the playoff matchups would look like if the Stanley Cup tournament started today:
Projected playoff bracket
Note: Projected point totals via Stathletes.
Eastern Conference
M1 Washington Capitals (110.2) vs. WC2 Philadelphia Flyers (91)
M2 Carolina Hurricanes (106.2) vs. M3 New Jersey Devils (105.3)
A1 Toronto Maple Leafs (108.8) vs. WC1 Boston Bruins (91.2)
A2 Tampa Bay Lightning (103.7) vs. A3 Florida Panthers (101.2)
Western Conference
P1 Edmonton Oilers (109) vs. WC2 Utah Hockey Club (97.5)
P2 Vegas Golden Knights (106.4) vs. P3 Vancouver Canucks (96.8)
C1 Minnesota Wild (105.8) vs. WC1 Colorado Avalanche (99.6)
C2 Dallas Stars (101.9) vs. C3 Winnipeg Jets (101.6)
ATLANTIC DIVISIONThe locks
Record: 19-10-2, 40 points
Playoff chances: 99.7%
Coach Craig Berube has the Leafs cruising in the regular season despite scoring less than three goals per game on average. They have Anthony Stolarz and Joseph Woll to thank for that, as both goalies have played well above expected in giving Toronto the league’s third-best team save percentage this season.
William Nylander has 18 goals. Mitch Marner has 41 points in 31 games. John Tavares now has 15 goals on the season. The Leafs thrived even without star Auston Matthews, who was limited to 22 games due to injury. He returned just as the Leafs reached the top of the division.
Cause for concern: Former Leafs coach Sheldon Keefe, now with the Devils, said Toronto had the “best goaltending in the league,” and they might — if their goalies stay healthy. Stolarz is on injured reserve. Woll has already visited IR this season. This was the risk GM Brad Treliving ran with this duo. All the Leafs need is for them to be healthy at the right time — in the spring.
Record: 16-10-2, 34 points
Playoff chances: 97.8%
The Lightning let Steven Stamkos walk as a free agent and actually got better offensively. Tampa Bay was the league’s top offensive team through 28 games, averaging four goals per game. Nikita Kucherov is doing big things again, with 46 points in 26 games. Linemates Brayden Point has 20 goals and Jake Guentzel has 17 goals, for a trio that has a 65% goals-for percentage at 5-on-5.
But the best news for the Bolts might be that Andrei Vasilevskiy looks like himself again, with a .910 save percentage and playing above expected.
Cause for concern: The Lightning aren’t a one-line team. They might be a two-line team, with Anthony Cirelli and Brandon Hagel putting up numbers together. But the challenge for the Bolts since their Stanley Cup wins has been rebuilding their supporting cast. Can they scare up enough offense from the bottom six? Does it even matter when the top two lines are this good?
Record: 19-11-2, 40 points
Playoff chances: 95.8%
The Stanley Cup champions are projected for 101 points, which would have them comfortably in the playoffs. There’s been little hangover for their elite players: Sam Reinhart had 19 goals in 31 games; Sam Bennett had 13 goals in 30 games; Matthew Tkachuk was over a point per game as was Aleksander Barkov, with both players missing a few games to injury. They’re sixth in goals per game …
Cause for concern: … and they’re 24th in goals against per game, thanks to goaltending from Sergei Bobrovsky and Spencer Knight that has the fifth worst team save percentage in the NHL. Both goalies are playing to below expected levels.
Despite some eye-opening numbers defensively in front of them — Carter Verhaeghe is somehow a minus-17 — the Panthers need more out of their goalies. The good news is that they’ll know they’ll get it from Bobrovsky when the playoffs start, as is tradition.
Work to do
Record: 16-13-3, 35 points
Playoff chances: 56.5%
Whether Jim Montgomery should or should not have paid for the Bruins’ middling start is a worthy debate. Having Jeremy Swayman play like a slice of Swiss cheese because he didn’t have a training camp — and not having Linus Ullmark there to pick up the slack — certainly didn’t help Montgomery’s job status in a lame-duck season. What’s not up for debate is that the Bruins didn’t respond to a variety of tactics from Montgomery to get their attention, from benching David Pastrnak to tense exchanges with captain Brad Marchand on the bench.
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Out went Monty and assistant coach Joe Sacco was elevated to the big job, his first since Colorado fired him in 2013. He has gone 8-4-0 in his first 12 games, no doubt helped by Swayman finding his game again — outside of an eight-goal hiccup against the Jets recently.
The Bruins remain a team trying to find consistency, their offense from last season and a return to that identity that made Boston a playoff team for eight straight seasons.
Cause for concern: That it’s not coaching, but construction. The Bruins have two players over 20 points this season in Pastrnak and Marchand. They’re also the only two players in double digits in goals. Elias Lindholm, who was GM Don Sweeney’s offseason prize, has three goals in 32 games, or as many as defenseman Hampus Lindholm.
The Bruins are 19th in expected goals per 60 minutes and 27th in actual 5-on-5 offense. Having a power play that clicks at 13% despite having Pastrnak as its most dangerous option has contributed to that lack of offensive punch, but there’s simply not enough offense on this roster. Where have you gone, Jake DeBrusk? (Answer: Vancouver, this past offseason as a free agent.)
Record: 15-13-2, 32 points
Playoff chances: 44.9%
Here’s a wild concept: When your goaltender plays well, your team has a significantly better chance to win. In eight Ottawa losses during which he appeared, Linus Ullmark has an .853 save percentage and a 4.07 goals-against average. In the 10 victories of which he has been a part, Ullmark has a .958 save percentage and a 1.20 goals-against average.
If nothing else, Ullmark is catching up to what has been a sneaky good defensive team at 5-on-5, where the Senators are seventh in expected goals. The Sens are on a 7-2-1 heater for head coach Travis Green as they hit the 30-game mark, inhabiting the last wild-card spot.
Cause for concern: Offensive depth has been a drag on the Senators. Brady Tkachuk — who, for the record, is not a New York Ranger at the moment — has his typical offensive balance (15 goals, 17 assists) to a line with Drake Batherson and Josh Norris. Leading scorer Tim Stutzle (36 points in 30 games) has worked his magic with Claude Giroux, and Adam Gaudette has 13 goals.
After that … well, at least the top six is piling up the points. Having offseason addition David Perron limited to nine games because of injury hasn’t helped.
Long shots, at best
Record: 12-14-4, 28 points
Playoff chances: 13.4%
The Red Wings actually have a better probability for making the playoff cut than some of their Eastern Conference rivals, despite being projected to finish with 83 points. Detroit was 26th in the NHL after 30 games (.467), which put it about the same distance from the league basement as it did the last wild-card spot in the East.
As long as the goaltenders are either Cam Talbot or Alex Lyon, the Red Wings have had a chance to win on most nights. But they’ve squandered a lot of those chances — and a decent 5-on-5 defense — with one of the worst penalty kills in the league (67.5%), and an offense that doesn’t seem to exist outside of the top-line trio of Alex DeBrincat, Dylan Larkin and Lucas Raymond.
Cause for concern: The NHL has seen its share of teams in which one line carried them to the postseason bubble. As good as the Larkin line is offensively, it has only a 43% goals-for percentage at 5-on-5 because it gives up so much the other way. But at least the line scores: Outside of that trio, the Red Wings don’t have another forward with more than 14 points through 30 games. That’s not going to cut it in the East.
Lottery-bound
Record: 11-16-3, 25 points
Playoff chances: 1.0%
The Canadiens have been more “fun bad” than “bad bad” thanks to the emergence of rookie defenseman Lane Hutson, whose electrifying offensive game has certainly met the preseason hype. Hutson, Nick Suzuki’s point-per-game season and Cole Caufield’s 17 goals in 30 games have made Montreal a team to watch but not a team to watch win, as the Canadiens have inhabited the basement of the Atlantic Division and the goals-against per game rankings.
Cause for concern: Sam Montembeault and Cayden Primeau came into the season as one of the more dependable areas of the Canadiens’ lineup but haven’t been a sturdy foundation for Montreal. Montembeault has rebounded from a rocky start (3.9 goals saved above expected) to a .900 save percentage. Primeau has not, with a .836 save percentage and minus-9.5 goals saved above expected, per Money Puck.
Record: 11-16-4, 26 points
Playoff chances: 0.1%
In a way, it’s painful to slot the Sabres here because it means a 14th straight season without a playoff berth, which is the longest drought in NHL history. At the same time, it was entirely predictable the Sabres would end up here, what with the longest playoff drought in NHL history and all.
Coach Lindy Ruff returned to Buffalo and through 31 games hasn’t been able to figure out how to turn this roster into a playoff contender. It hasn’t happened. The team is right around where it was defensively under Don Granato but with worse goaltending. The notion that the Sabres could score their way out of their problems didn’t manifest either, as they’re down year over year.
Cause for concern: GM Kevyn Adams didn’t really offer much hope for a turnaround during his recent media availability, citing the challenges for making the Sabres better — higher taxes and a lack of “palm trees” in New York State, for example — rather than solutions for getting Buffalo back to the playoffs. He cited drafting and development as a preferred path, but the Sabres’ young players aren’t progressing in a satisfactory way, with Adams saying Owen Power is “a work in progress” as one example.
METROPOLITAN DIVISIONThe locks
Record: 21-7-2, 44 points
Playoff chances: 99.8%
There are probably more than a few teams kicking themselves for not getting Spencer Carbery’s name on a contract before the Capitals did. The 43-year-old coach guided Washington to an unexpected playoff berth last season and had them at the top of the NHL through 29 games this season. There’s no question some shrewd front office moves helped create this juggernaut, but it’s Carbery that’s made the lineup sing.
It’s a lineup that had Alex Ovechkin for 18 games, in which he scored 15 goals for the fastest start of this illustrious career. A fractured leg kept him out since Nov. 18, but he’s on the mend and ready to continue his pursuit of Wayne Gretzky’s all-time goals record, trailing The Great One by 26 goals.
Cause for concern: Is this sustainable? The Capitals have the league’s second-highest shooting percentage at 5-on-5 (11.6%). The even strength offense is outpacing what their expected goals portends. Their goaltending tandem of Charlie Lindgren and Logan Thompson is making them a better defensive team at 5-on-5 than what the analytics claim.
As their playoff probability indicates, they’ve banked a bunch of points and seem poised for the postseason. But how good are these Capitals?
Record: 19-10-3, 43 points
Playoff chances: 99.3%
Stop us if you’ve heard this before: The Hurricanes are analytics darlings (first in expected goals) who have the best percentage of shot attempts (59.7%) at 5-on-5 for any NHL team. Their penalty kill is elite (third in the NHL) and they’re 14-0-1 when leading after two periods.
It’s a Rod Brind’Amour team, through and through. The names change but the standard of regular-season excellence remains the same — and thanks in no small part to a star-making season by forward Martin Necas, the Canes might end up being the best offensive team of the coach’s tenure in Raleigh.
Cause for concern: Pyotr Kochetkov was played barely above expected this season, one of five goalies the Hurricanes have used. There’s a reason rumors persist about Carolina being hot after Mackenzie Blackwood before his trade to Colorado, and potentially in on Anaheim goalie John Gibson. On a team with so much machine-like greatness, their goaltending still feels like a work in progress.
Record: 20-10-3, 43 points
Playoff chances: 99.1%
After disappearing during a disappointing 2023-24 season, the swaggering Devils are back.
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The seventh best offensive team in the NHL (3.33) is convinced it can score its way out of any problem, and why not? Jesper Bratt (41 points), Jack Hughes (39), Nico Hischier (28, with 16 goals), Timo Meier (22 points) and Dougie Hamilton (21) an turbo-charge their offense. That includes the league’s second-best power play, at 30%.
GM Tom Fitzgerald made some key additions in the offseason, and nearly all of them have hit — especially forward Stefan Noesen, who is tied for second in goals (13) on the team. One player that was a little late in coming around was goalie Jacob Markstrom, who was guilty of some ill-timed goals against this season. But he’s been outstanding lately, giving up two goals or fewer in seven of nine recent starts.
Cause for concern: Why does this team have so many non-competitive clunkers? Losing 4-0 to Colorado. Losing 3-0 to St. Louis. Getting goalie’d in losses to San Jose and Toronto.
There are still too many mental lapses from a team with Stanley Cup aspirations — like the fact that in 19 of 33 games the Devils have given up the first goal. They have won 11 of those games, a tribute to their offensive acumen.
Work to do
Record: 14-13-4, 32 points
Playoff chances: 54.3%
It’s reasonable to ask how the Flyers are possibly doing this well, what with the offense only slightly better than last season while giving up more goals per game thanks to porous goaltending. But that’s what coach John Tortorella does: He gets his teams to play hard and pick up enough points to bounce around the bubble. Sometimes they get in the playoffs. Sometimes they fall short. Not exactly the best recipe for rebuilds or retools, but he doesn’t know how to coach any other way.
Matvei Michkov has been everything the Flyers wanted, with 27 points in 29 games to lead all rookies in scoring while lighting up the highlight reel. The goaltending battery of Samuel Ersson, Aleksei Kolosov and Ivan Fedotov is everything the Flyers feared it could be, with none of them better than an .891 save percentage, and all of them playing below expected levels.
Cause for concern: It still probably makes more sense for GM Daniel Briere to be a seller at the trade deadline, if it means finding a taker for defenseman Rasmus Ristolainen, forward Joel Farabee or center Morgan Frost, whom Torts recently removed from Michkov’s line. In the case of Frost, a trade there would make an already precarious center position even thinner, depending on the return.
Record: 13-14-5, 31 points
Playoff chances: 25.1%
Ask a Penguins fan if there’s a 25% chance that this version of the team makes the Eastern Conference playoff cut, and prepare to have the conversation end with hearty laughter. Sure, the Penguins are right at the playoff bubble after 32 games and that’s reflected in the Stathletes model giving them a decent shot at making the cut. But the Penguins are the worst defensive team in the NHL at 5-on-5 and overall this season, thanks in part to goaltending that has played well below replacement levels.
Pittsburgh is hovering around .500 thanks to — who else? — Sidney Crosby’s 30 points in 32 games and Evgeni Malkin’s 25 points. They’ve helped Rickard Rakell to 13 goals and Bryan Rust to 12 tallies. Thanks in part to new assistant coach David Quinn, their power play is inching near the top 10.
Cause for concern: It’s going to take a modicum of defense for the Penguins to make the postseason, and Pittsburgh is deficient there. The Penguins are 28th in expected goals against at 5-on-5 in front of Alex Nedeljkovic and Tristan Jarry, both of whom are well below minus-3.3 goals saved above expected per game.
Record: 15-14-1, 31 points
Playoff chances: 7.4%
The Rangers are in a full-on tailspin at the moment, losing 10 of 13 games, all of them in regulation. GM Chris Drury tried to put a scare into them with a trade memo to all 31 other general managers, following through on that “open for business” vow by moving captain Jacob Trouba to the Ducks. But that shock to the system didn’t improve effort and execution on the ice.
The next major change might be the coach who has been unable to improve them this season, and has watched core veteran players put up inexplicably mediocre numbers within the context of their usual output.
Cause for concern: Look no further than the third period for the best evidence of the Rangers’ inconsistent offense and fragile psyche. New York is 13-1-0 when leading after two periods. They’re 0-11-1 when trailing after two periods. Something has to change.
Record: 12-13-7, 31 points
Playoff chances: 5.8%
What we’ve learned about the 2024-25 Islanders is that they don’t have the offense that can withstand Mathew Barzal sitting out 21 games and Anthony Duclair sitting out 26. The Islanders are 25th in goals per game, and have the league’s most toothless power play at 12.2%. (While being “toothless” can sometimes be a badge of honor in hockey, the term is meant here to mean they can’t score.)
But Barzal is back and so is valuable defenseman Adam Pelech, who has sat out 19 games this season and will hopefully help the league’s worst penalty kill (64.7%). Duclair is expected back soon. They’ll certainly help an Islanders team desperate for reinforcements, but one that has managed to hang tight in the East by hoovering up points through regulation ties — after tying for the league lead in overtime/shootout losses last season (16), New York leads the NHL with seven through 32 games this season.
Cause for concern: Ilya Sorokin is right around where he ended up in save percentage last season, and is playing at a slightly better than expected rate, but Semyon Varlamov has gone from capable backup to liability this season. He’s 3-4-3 with an .889 save percentage and minus-4.4 goals saved above expected. The Islanders put him on injured reserve earlier this month because of a lower-body injury. Hopefully, Varlamov can sort things out, because one of the NHL’s premier goalie tandems has become unbalanced.
Lottery-bound
Record: 12-14-5, 29 points
Playoff chances: 0.1%
The Blue Jackets deserve a mulligan for this season after the tragic loss of Johnny Gaudreau in August, but to their credit the team has played nearly .500 hockey (.468 points percentage) and has been a very tough opponent in the East.
The highlights start with veteran defenseman Zach Werenski, who has played himself into Norris Trophy contention with a point-per-game season through 31 (healthy, most importantly) games. Kirill Marchenko leads the team in goals. Sean Monahan, playing through palpable grief, had 25 points in 31 games. The team’s younger players continue to progress — although they’d probably like a bit more from Adam Fantilli at this stage.
Cause for concern: As competitive as they’ve been under new head coach Dean Evason, it all gets undercut by the 31st-ranked goaltending in the NHL this season (.874 save percentage). Elvis Merzļikins is somehow 9-9-2 while posting an .887 save percentage and a staggering minus-11.7 goals saved above expected. Daniil Tarasov hasn’t been much better: .857 save percentage and minus-8.3 goals saved above expected. Maybe the recently recalled Jet Greaves can help stabilize things.
CENTRAL DIVISIONThe locks
Record: 20-7-4, 44 points
Playoff chances: 97.2%
Kirill Kaprizov has carried the Wild to near the league’s best record this season, with 22 goals and 25 points in 30 games. That’s nearly 20 points better than second-leading scorer Matt Boldy. That’s an MVP-worthy season for a player that’s not gotten his due as one of the NHL’s premier talents because his team was never as prestigious as his skillset.
But not this season, as the Wild sprinted to catch the streaking Jets with a hot streak of their own. They’re defensively dominant: 1.99 expected goals against per 60 minutes at 5-on-5, in front of stellar goaltending from Filip Gustavsson (6.0 goals saved above expected). Their offense in the top half of the league. Minnesota is 14-0-0 when leading after two periods.
Cause for concern: They’ve done all of this with the 30th best penalty kill in the league, at 70.7% through 31 games. This is a multi-season trend, as the Wild were also 30th last season (74.5%). Coach John Hynes said recently that the key might just be to stay out of the penalty box. Alas, the Wild are 28th in penalties taken per 60 minutes.
Record: 19-11-0, 38 points
Playoff chances: 90.9%
A little adversity never hurt a potential Stanley Cup contender.
The Stars are projected to finish with 102 points in a season where star Tyler Seguin (20 points in 19 games) was lost for the regular season due to hip surgery; where players like Jason Robertson (seven goals) and Wyatt Johnston (six goals) are off their expected offensive pace; and where the team’s power play is a disappointing 22nd in the league (18.3%). Goalies Jake Oettinger and Casey DeSmith have helped cover for a 5-on-5 defense that’s 16th in expected goals against per 60 minutes.
That gloom aside, the Stars have gotten awesome seasons out of Matt Duchene (30 points) and Mason Marchment (12 goals) and remain one of the better teams in the West.
Cause for concern: The Stars’ offense is down year over year from their .689 points percentage season in 2023-24. Their shooting percentage has dropped from 9.4% to 8.9%. Some players are underperforming. There’s now a Tyler Seguin-sized hole in the lineup until GM Jim Nill uses that cap space to acquire someone with Seguin on long-term injured reserve.
Dallas is navigating its first season without Joe Pavelski since 2019, and that could be a factor here.
Record: 22-9-1, 45 points
Playoff chances: 90.0%
The Jets had one of the best starts in NHL history, setting a league record with 15 wins in their first 16 games. They could beat you offensively (third in goals per game) or defensively, thanks to having Vezina Trophy winner Connor Hellebuyck as the last line of defense. The presumed Team USA starter for the 4 Nations Face-Off has a .926 save percentage and three shutouts this season, going 19-5-1 in 25 games. Winnipeg is 16-0-1 when leading after two periods.
The Jets banked so many points early on that it’s hard to imagine them missing the playoff cut, and they’ve successfully played through some wobbles. If Hellebuyck is good, they’re good.
Cause for concern: The Jets have been candid about their disappointment last postseason, when Colorado eliminated them in the first round. They entered the playoffs on a winning streak. They had handled the Avs in the regular season. It didn’t matter.
The Jets have flown so high this season that, at times, it’s come easy. Keeping those egos and emotions grounded it essential to whatever this group ends up doing in the latter part of the season and in the playoffs.
Work to do
Record: 18-15-0, 36 points
Playoff chances: 85.3%
Patience was the greatest virtue for the Avalanche this season. They picked up points at the start of the season here and then, staying in the playoff picture until reinforcements arrived in the form of forwards Valeri Nichushkin and Artturi Lehkonen, sorely missed lineup absences. The Avs are 9-6-0 with Big Val in the lineup, having won five of their past seven games.
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Colorado still isn’t 100% but can play through injury absences while Nathan MacKinnon is gunning for a second straight MVP (50 points in 32 games), Mikko Rantanen is gunning for a free agent payday (18 goals) and Cale Makar is, well, Cale Makar (37 points in 32 games).
Cause for concern: On the opposite end of patience was what GM Chris MacFarland exhibited in evaluating his goaltending.
The Avalanche nuked their goalie tandem of Alexandar Georgiev and Justus Annunen, turning the former into Mackenzie Blackwood of the Sharks and the latter into Scott Wedgewood of the Predators. Both of these new goalies have looked good in the short term for the Avalanche, but the question remains if this battery is good enough to win a Stanley Cup behind the assemblage of talent in front of it.
Record: 14-11-5, 33 points
Playoff chances: 73.6%
Give the Hockey Club credit: After a blistering 4-1-1 start to the season and a course correction that coincided with a long-term injury to defenseman Sean Durzi, Utah put together a nice 6-1-2 streak in December that positioned it well in the wild-card race.
Dylan Guenther (13 goals) has been outstanding, making GM Bill Armstrong look like a genius for securing him to a long-term deal. Clayton Keller (28 points), Logan Cooley (26 points) and Mikhail Sergachev (22) have all hit their marks, with Sergachev skating over 25 minutes per game on average. Utah is poised to give its new fans in Salt Lake City the best welcome gift: a playoff race.
Cause for concern: Goalie Karel Vejmelka might be Utah’s MVP so far this season with a .915 save percentage in 17 games, despite a 6-7-2 record. He has 6.9 goals saved above average and a .600 quality starts percentage. That has helped Utah overcome a dud of a season from Connor Ingram, who has a 6-4-3 record but only a .871 save percentage and a minus-10.9 goals saved above expected.
Ingram has been out recently because of an upper-body injury. If he comes back as the netminder he was for the Coyotes last season, Utah’s in business. If not, Vejmelka can’t do it alone.
Record: 15-14-3, 33 points
Playoff chances: 14.2%
GM Doug Armstrong is nothing if not aggressive. There were the offer sheets that led to the Blues acquiring Philip Broberg and Dylan Holloway from the Oilers. There was the recent trade that added Cam Fowler from the Ducks, ostensibly to replace injured Nick Leddy. Then there was the boldest of bold moves: Firing Drew Bannister 22 games into his tenure as head coach to hire Jim Montgomery five days after the Bruins fired him.
Fortune favors the bold: The Blues are 6-2-2 under Monty, with five games in which they gave up two or fewer goals. They’re clogging the D-zone and making life more difficult for opponents at 5-on-5.
Cause for concern: The defense is improving. The offense remains the worry point. Sure, the Blues have received some great performances from Jordan Kyrou (27 points, including 13 goals), Holloway (a career-best 10 goals) and Robert Thomas, who sat out some because of injury but had 23 points in 20 games. But overall, the Blues are 26th in 5-on-5 offense and 27th on the power play after 32 games. That’s not going to cut it in the explosive West.
Long shots, at best
Record: 8-17-6, 22 points
Playoff chances: 8.5%
The biggest disappointment in the NHL this season, and it’s not particularly close.
GM Barry Trotz added three key free agents — Steven Stamkos, Jonathan Marchessault and Brady Skjei — to a young roster that qualified for the playoffs last season, hoping to take a leap forward as a contender while buying time for the next wave of prospects to progress. Unfortunately, Nashville rejected the transplant, scuttling what was in theory a pretty great plan. Stamkos has eight goals in 31 games. Skjei’s partnership with Roman Josi was a disaster. The Predators plummeted to last in the NHL, and without the goaltending of Juuse Saros it would have been even worse.
Cause for concern: So why are the Predators a “long shot” instead of “lottery-bound?” Well, Stathletes still gives them a better shot at making the playoffs than a handful of teams. And the fact remains that this team won 14 of 16 games after the All-Star break last season to catapult into the playoffs. The Blackhawks, Sharks and Ducks don’t have that in them. The Predators at least have some proof of concept, and a bunch of players whose track records do not portend a full campaign of this kind of awfulness.
The concern is that last season’s streak in not repeatable. Especially with U2 no longer playing at Sphere — for whom the Predators can deny their players tickets to see, which sparked that wild run. More to the point: They’re projected to finish with 85 points. They needed 99 to make the playoffs last season. The hole is probably too deep already.
Lottery-bound
Record: 10-19-2, 22 points
Playoff chances: 0.0%
Luke Richardson is a good man whose time was up in Chicago. From bungling the Taylor Hall scratch to an overemphasis on defense to star Connor Bedard’s palpable discontent with his own play and the team’s lack of success, there was no more delaying the inevitable after 26 games.
AHL coach Anders Sorensen took over, and has the Blackhawks playing better in the short term. Perhaps not coincidentally, Bedard has found his smile again, with seven points in Sorensen’s first five games as coach.
Cause for celebration: There’s not been much of it, to be honest. The teardown that allowed the Blackhawks to draft Bedard first overall has left Chicago with a steeper rebuild than other recent teams that tanked. He doesn’t have his Nicklas Backstrom or Evgeni Malkin or Leon Draisaitl to run shotgun with him — unless Frank Nazar becomes that guy.
The good news is that a down season for Bedard by his standards is still 26 points in 31 games, and it’s clear the 19-year-old star has the same disgust for losing as someone such as Nathan MacKinnon does. (That Team Canada snub is a nice carrot in front of him as well.)
PACIFIC DIVISIONThe locks
Record: 18-11-2, 38 points
Playoff chances: 99.4%
The Oilers played through their early season Stanley Cup Final hangover — underperforming scorers, a brief Connor McDavid injury absence — before really finding their stride again. Edmonton won eight of nine games against teams like Colorado, Minnesota, Tampa Bay and Vegas.
The Stathletes model loves them, giving the Oil the third-best odds to qualify for the playoffs, probably due to the top-heavy Pacific Division plus the McDavid and Leon Draisaitl of it all. With a blockbuster contract starting next season, Draisaitl leads the league in goals, with 23 in 31 games.
Cause for concern: It’s hard to believe the Oilers are going to be a sub-8% shooting percentage team at 5-on-5 for much longer, and players like Zach Hyman and Ryan Nugent-Hopkins have started to get going. But the difference between winning the Stanley Cup and losing in a Game 7 can sometimes be the supporting cast. Edmonton’s has yet to coalesce this season.
Record: 20-8-3, 43 points
Playoff chances: 98.1%
The Knights began the season without original Golden Misfit Jonathan Marchessault and with questions about their forward group on the wings. They responded with the fifth best offense in the league through 31 games (3.45 goals per game), thanks to the elite duo of Jack Eichel (42 points in 31 games in an MVP-level season) and Ivan Barbashev (a team-best 15 goals). They skated well with Pavel Dorofeyev (12 goals) and Mark Stone before his injury, but the Knights have gotten offense throughout their lineup.
Vegas has 13 players in double-digits in points, including defensemen Shea Theodore, Alex Pietrangelo and Noah Hanifin.
Cause for concern: The Knights have been better than expected offensively, but their 5-on-5 defense has been right around where the analytics say it should be … and that’s not a great thing.
Vegas is 23rd in goals against at 5-on-5, although not having Stone for 14 games certainly impacts that. Sub-.900 goaltending from Adin Hill and Ilya Samsonov hasn’t helped, as neither goalie is playing better than expected, per Stathletes.
Work to do
Record: 16-9-5, 37 points
Playoff chances: 72.9%
Like some other teams at this point in the season, it’s difficult to really pass judgment on Vancouver because of a significant lineup absence. In this case it was goalie Thatcher Demko, second for the Vezina Trophy last season, who just returned to the lineup after being out because of a lower-body injury. Kevin Lankinen held the fort for the Canucks with above-expected play in 21 appearances, but he’s not anywhere near Demko’s level — assuming the star goalie can find his form again.
That wasn’t the only significant absence: High-scoring forward J.T. Miller sat out 10 games after stepping away from the team for personal reasons. Then there was the local panic over Elias Pettersson’s slow start — he now has 26 points through 29 games — and coach Rick Tocchet’s public criticism of his team’s effort. There’s never a dull moment in Vancouver. Luckily, defenseman Quinn Hughes has been a stabilizing force, the best player on the team and a low-key MVP contender.
Cause for concern: The “duds,” as Tocchet has called them — inexplicably pedestrian efforts from a talented team. Tocchet said some of his players take half the game before they’re emotionally invested. Others are straight up “struggling to get emotionally invested in the game” at all, according to the coach.
Some of this can probably be chalked up to regular-season malaise, but Tocchet felt compelled to call it out months before the playoffs. The West is intense. As the coach said, “You have to be jacked up to play the game. You have to be emotionally in the game.”
Record: 18-9-3, 39 points
Playoff chances: 63.7%
The Kings had been a solid defensive team before Jim Hiller, and have been an even better one under their latest head coach. Los Angeles led the NHL in goals against per game (2.50) through 30 games, ranking second to the Wild in expected goals against per 60 minutes at 5-on-5 (2.03) and third in actual goals against per 60 at 5-on-5 (1.88).
All of that played out minus star defenseman Drew Doughty, who has sat out the season because of an ankle injury; and in front of at times great goaltending from Darcy Kuemper and not-so-great from David Rittich.
Cause for concern: Quinton Byfield has followed up his best offensive season (55 points in 80 games, including 20 goals) with a regression to four goals and nine assists through 30 games. They’ve tried to establish him as a center for his own line after playing the majority of his time with Anze Kopitar last season. He’s tremendously talented and still so young (22) that concerns about him long term should be tempered; but for this season, they could use more out of Q.
Long shots, at best
Record: 15-11-5, 35 points
Playoff chances: 5.3%
The Flames have been one of the best stories of the season in the Pacific Division, jumping out to a 12-6-3 record thanks to an uptick in offense and the goaltending of rookie Dustin Wolf.
But the vibes have shifted a bit: Though Calgary banked enough points to remain in the playoff picture, it has gone 3-5-2 in the past 10 games. That included a wobble from Wolf, although his recent shutout over the Panthers might be an indication that he hasn’t hit a rookie wall.
Cause for concern: Calgary’s defense and goaltending have helped make things interesting, but the Flames aren’t going to be a playoff team without improving their offense. Calgary is 28th in the NHL at 5-on-5 scoring (1.98 goals per 60 minutes) and are 26th overall in goals per game overall (2.61).
Jonathan Huberdeau (21) and Nazem Kadri (20) are the only Flames with over 20 points in their first 31 games. All of this is understandable given how much offense has walked out the door over the last year, including Elias Lindholm and Andrew Mangiapane most recently. But that inability to put the puck in the net — or have the overall talent depth to do it with frequency — will be their undoing.
Record: 15-15-2, 32 points
Playoff chances: 1.0%
The Kraken’s offense (2.97 goals per game) is improved over last season (2.61). Some of that credit goes to GM Ron Francis, who added center Chandler Stephenson and defenseman Brandon Montour to the roster and watched them become top-five scorers on Seattle this season. Some of that credit should go to new head coach Dan Bylsma, especially in finally getting young center Shane Wright going with a career-best seven goals.
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Overall, the Kraken are just a middle-of-the-road team. Nothing too terrible, nothing too exemplary. Their defense and save percentage at 5-on-5 is a little closer to the bottom third of the league than Seattle might like, but they’re bettering their expected goals offensively.
If things don’t change in the standings, Seattle could be an influential seller at the trade deadline with center Yanni Gourde and winger Brandon Tanev among their expiring contracts.
Cause for concern: The Kraken’s miniscule playoff odds might not square with being only a couple of wins out of a wild card, but how many of the teams ahead of Seattle in the standings can one honestly say this Kraken team is better than?
They were a .500 team after 32 games, and that might just be the roster that Francis has on his hands right now. Most likely, it’ll depend on the maturation of the young players on the roster (Matty Beniers, Wright) and on the way (Berkly Catton) to elevate them.
Lottery-bound
Record: 11-14-4, 26 points
Playoff chances: 0.1%
The Ducks are a team at a crossroads. Their defense is porous, although the recent addition of Rangers captain Jacob Trouba and subtraction of veteran Cam Fowler should help. Despite a collection of strong young offensive talents, they’re 31st in goals per game through 29 games. The fact is that those young talents just aren’t hitting the board the way they should: Leo Carlsson, Mason McTavish, Cutter Gauthier and especially the now-injured Trevor Zegras have all been middling, although Carlsson has had his moments.
Does GM Pat Verbeek get aggressive in reshaping his young core? Or does he look at coach Greg Cronin and wonder if someone else could finally unlock his team’s considerable offensive upside?
Cause for celebration: The NHL’s MVP will never come from a team as dreadful as the Ducks are this season (.448 points percentage), but it’s reasonable to ask how much more dreadful they’d be without goalie Lukas Dostal. He’s third in the NHL in goals saved above expected (9.34). Anaheim is 32nd in the NHL in expected goals against per game at 5-on-5 and 15th in actual goals against per game.
Between Dostal’s 17 games of .920 save percentage hockey and another 10 decent games from veteran John Gibson, Anaheim has been more competitive than its play would normally allow.
Record: 11-17-5, 27 points
Playoff chances: 0.0%
The Sharks basically set the bar on the floor last season with a .287 points percentage, so clearing that wasn’t going to be too difficult. Their .409 points percentage through 33 games is pleasantly putrid: bad enough to land a rebuilding team in the lottery again, but showing signs of upward mobility in the standings. First-year coach Ryan Warsofsky has them improved offensively, defensively and on the penalty kill year-over-year.
The young players are trending in the right direction and the veterans are improving their trade value. GM Mike Grier is doing exactly what he should do as the architect of a rebuild: See the Mackenzie Blackwood trade, in which he traded a good goalie that could hurt their draft standing for a mediocre one (Alexandar Georgiev) while picking up a second-rounder and prospect Nikolai Kovalenko. Again, this man should have been NHL general manager of the year last season. No one did their job more effectively — emphasis on “doing the job,” in wrestling parlance.
Cause for celebration: The term “franchise player” gets tossed around a lot, but Macklin Celebrini is the embodiment of one. He has 20 points in his first 21 games, is playing better defense at 5-on-5 than you’d ever expect from an 18-year-old, and has charisma to spare. The Sharks drafted a special one first overall last summer.