2023 NHL Playoffs: Tiers for Every Team in the Postseason
You'll have to forgive your hockey fan friends today.
On the morning after the opening night of NHL playoffs, you may find them experiencing signs of extreme giddiness or agitation (depending on their team allegiances), alongside sleepiness and bouts of daydreaming/armchair coaching.
In fact, you may have to get used to it. It's typically a two-month ailment.
Indeed, the 16-team tournament to determine who hoists the Stanley Cup got underway in four cities on Monday night and will continue with another four on Tuesday as the event winds to its parade-lap conclusion sometime in mid-to-late June.
The puck heads at B/R have been experiencing our own symptoms as the postseason has approached, too, and we're continuing to cope while also continuing to get together to discuss content—in this case dissecting the playoff field into tiers of contention.
We came up with four levels and assigned teams based on their regular-season play, their prospective matchups and just the general feel of how likely it seems that any one of them could be doused in Champagne at any point in the near future.
Scroll through to get our thoughts and feel free to drop a few of your own in the comments.
Long Shots
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Seattle Kraken
Hey, we like the Kraken as much as anyone. They suffered through the inaugural season expansion pains and were a non-factor last year but transformed into a prolific offense that averaged more than 3.5 goals per game.
And the 40-point jump in the standings is nothing to sneeze at.
But they had the misfortune of drawing the defending champs in the first round. And though there are some reasons to suggest they can make it a long series and perhaps even win it, it's difficult to then foresee them doing it three more times against high-end foes.
Florida Panthers
One team won 65 of 82 games while setting a record for points in a season, had a goal differential nearly twice as large as the next best team and posted both the best home and road records in the league.
The other is the Florida Panthers.
It was a prodigious fall from winning a Presidents' Trophy to clawing into the tournament in the final week, but that's where the Panthers find themselves. Forget the 16 games it'd take to win the whole tournament—it's hard to see them winning more than one at all.
New York Islanders
The Islanders were the last team included on this slide for a reason.
They have capable goaltending with Ilya Sorokin. They have a returning offensive star in Mathew Barzal, whose presence could activate the talents of trade-deadline pickup Bo Horvat. And they have several players on board who went to the playoff final four in both 2020 and 2021.
But the enormity of the feat, particularly in an ungodly stacked East, seems just too much. It wouldn't be earth-shattering to see them find a way to sneak past Carolina, but to follow that up with two more series wins just to get to the Cup final is too big an ask.
Puncher's Chance
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Minnesota Wild
In boxing, the puncher's chance tag is applicable to a fight that's gone one way for 11 rounds that instantly changes in Round 12. In hockey, it's more emblematic of a team that has title-quality attributes but would have to have everything break right for two months.
It applies to the Wild in that they have three-time Cup winner Marc-André Fleury in goal and talented forwards like 40-goal man Kirill Kaprizov, who's played just six games since March 1, and Matt Boldy, who scored 31 times in his first full season as an NHLer.
Minnesota's 103 points were only sixth-best in the West, but the Wild are certainly talented enough to get on a roll, particularly if they get past Dallas to win their first playoff series since 2015.
Winnipeg Jets
The Jets had reached the playoffs four straight times before last season's miss and they made their way back into the field this time around in spite of a fast start that devolved into a prolonged .500 run over the last 30 games.
Feel free to trace nearly every reason for springtime optimism back to Vezina-quality goaltender Connor Hellebuyck, whose .920 save percentage was third in the league and four shutouts were tied for fifth.
A first-round matchup with Pacific champ Vegas is daunting but winnable, and the momentum generated by such a triumph could yield prolonged dividends.
Los Angeles Kings
The Kings made a quantum leap from irrelevance to contender status with their playoff berth last spring and nearly reached the second round while providing a big scare to Edmonton.
They were a power player out West for most of this season before skidding to just 5-5 over the final 10 games and falling from first in the Pacific to third, which yielded a first-round rematch with the Oilers that began on Monday night in Alberta.
Veterans like Drew Doughty and Anze Kopitar were part of a run that included two Cups and a final four appearance in three seasons from 2011-12 to 2013-14. Just like the Jets, a first-round upset against Edmonton could trigger a belief such success could happen again.
Tampa Bay Lightning
Hard to fathom that a three-time defending conference champion—not to mention a two-time Cup winner—has been relegated to the third tier of contention, but that's what it's feeling like these days for a team that stumbled to a 9-13-2 record down the stretch.
Andrei Vasilevskiy can string together four wins against anybody. And with the point-per-game scorers Nikita Kucherov, Brayden Point and Steven Stamkos, it's unlikely offense will be a long-term issue.
Nevertheless, it just feels as if another deep run would be too heavy a lift. Beating Toronto in the first round seems hard enough, not to mention a likely follow-up with Boston. The Lightning won't be out of it until Jon Cooper is out of locker room speeches, but he'll have to be epic.
New York Rangers
Speaking of hard to fathom, how often have guys like Patrick Kane and Vladimir Tarasenko—who've got four Cups and 93 playoff goals between them—been only considered punchers?
But that's the case in a loaded East for the star-studded Rangers, who finished just fifth in the conference even with 107 points. Holdovers Artemi Panarin and Mika Zibanejad combined for 68 goals and 183 points and the team boasts the reigning Vezina (Igor Shesterkin) and 2020-21 Norris (Adam Fox) trophy winners.
That said, New York was just 1-2-1 in four games against first-round foe New Jersey, which scored on Shesterkin 13 times. Having to play the Devils drops the Rangers from contenders to hopefuls, but a first-round upset could change their trajectory in a big way.
Contenders
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Colorado Avalanche
They're the defending champs.
They have legitimate star power in Nathan MacKinnon, Cale Makar and Mikko Rantanen and a roster full of players who'll fight and claw to get another chance to grasp the chalice.
Any team that racks up 109 points and finishes tied for sixth in a 32-team league has to be considered legit, particularly with the Avalanche's championship track record. They've been dinged up as a whole and they'll miss Gabriel Landeskog's grit, but it shouldn't surprise anyone if they win.
Dallas Stars
It feels like a lot of people are undervaluing the Stars these days.
Statistically speaking, they're as versatile as anyone with the league's seventh-best scoring offense and its third-best defense. Goalie Jake Oettinger is just 24 years old and a relative playoff newbie, but he's also among the league's leaders by all meaningful measures.
And speaking of young players, Jason Robertson, 23, was one of 11 100-point scorers in the regular season and could certainly sway a series if he finds himself on a goal-scoring heater.
Vegas Golden Knights
A division champion with proven playoff pedigree, Vegas returns to the dance this spring after missing out last season in spite of 94 points and 43 wins.
It'll be fascinating to see how Jack Eichel handles his first turn on the postseason stage after so many years in Buffalo purgatory and if the team as a whole can maintain the 22-4-5 run it's been on since early February.
The biggest question? Who'll be the goalie. Laurent Brossoit was a late-season find and Jonathan Quick is on hand, too, with his two-Cup pedigree from Los Angeles.
Edmonton Oilers
If you're looking for a trendy pick from outside Massachusetts, look no further.
The Oilers have veered from irrelevant to merely disappointing for much of the 33 years since their last Cup win in 1990, when Hall of Fame inductees Mark Messier, Jari Kurri and Kevin Lowe were the hoisters in chief.
These days, it's perennial MVP/Art Ross candidate Connor McDavid and running mate Leon Draisaitl, along with fellow 100-point man Ryan Nugent-Hopkins and trade-deadline Mattias Ekholm, with whom Edmonton was 18-2-1 down the stretch. Presuming rookie goalie Stuart Skinner can keep it on the road, the "City of Champions" bandwagon is in good hands.
Toronto Maple Leafs
So, while we're talking history, let's talk Toronto history.
The Maple Leafs haven't won a Cup since 1967 and nary a playoff series of any sort since 2004, which means the general populace in their hockey-obssessed city these days is never too far away from an emotional meltdown—particularly amid a first-round rematch with Tampa Bay.
Coach Sheldon Keefe's club is flat-out loaded. The Leafs are hungry and skilled. And the bump that'd come from defeating the Lightning might be exactly what it'd take to get them all the way to the end of the championship path.
Carolina Hurricanes
The Hurricanes have done everything asked of them this season.
Carolina was just 6-6-1 across its final 13 games, which could take some of the bloom off the contender rose, but it finished second overall to Boston, won a third straight title in the Metropolitan Division and was No. 2 in the league in goals against and penalty killing.
That's a recipe for success in the playoffs, particularly with the stalwart likes of Brent Burns on the blue line for this year's run. The Hurricanes won't dazzle anyone with their locker room star power, but it should surprise no one if Rod Brind'Amour adds a coaching Cup to the one he won as their captain in 2006.
New Jersey Devils
The Devils were among the longest of long shots when it came to the preseason.
They were 28th in the league last season, and in spite of a busy summer for GM Tom Fitzgerald, there weren't a lot of people reserving playoff tickets in Newark last October.
But it's been a revelation of an 82-game run in North Jersey thanks to the hitting of young stars like Jack Hughes (99 points) and Nico Hischier (80 points), alongside eight other players who scored at least 10 goals. Drawing the New York Rangers in the first round was a tough break, but it's exactly the sort of test a young team needs to pass.
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The Favorites
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Could it have been anyone else?
Let's face it, when you win 65 of 82 games, set a record for points, lead your division by 24 points and have a No. 1 goalie with a sub-2.00 goals-against average, there's a pretty clear expectation that you're going to win the whole thing.
That's where the Bruins find themselves.
Their historic regular season has gotten them to a place where anything short of a 16-game blitz through the playoffs will be considered a letdown, and given their run of eight straight wins—and 15 in 16 games—down the stretch, it wouldn't be a surprise.
And, as forward Nick Foligno insists, it's not a concern either.
"We're gonna face some really good teams and we know we still have levels to get to as a club, which I think is scary in some ways," he told reporters. "But exciting for us. I think that's kind of the mindset and the attitude that we have."
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