Final 2023-24 Regular-Season Report Cards for Every NHL Team
The 2023-24 NHL regular season is officially done, so it's time to talk about how all 32 teams did.
It's report card time and we are handing out grades for every team's regular-season performance.
In some cases, it should be obvious who excelled and who didn't. But sometimes you have to take expectations and other variables into play. We try to do all of that as fairly as we can with our grades, measuring expectations vs. unexpected variables vs. actual results.
So, let's get to it and look at every team's regular season.
Arizona Coyotes
1 of 32
Grade: C
In the end nobody is going to remember how this team actually did on the ice. They are just going to remember this as the season the Arizona Coyotes wrapped up their tumultuous time in Arizona before relocating to Salt Lake City.
It is a sad end for a franchise that never had a chance, while also getting countless chances from the league.
Ownership was never consistent (or good), the arena situation never got resolved, and the team never really won. It's hard to build a consistent and steady fanbase when all of that is happening. Still, the Coyotes did have their loyal followers and the whole thing stinks for them.
As for the team, it did pretty much what was expected of it: It lost. The Coyotes have some intriguing pieces in place, and Logan Cooley—their best prospect—started to take big strides in the second half of the season.
They still have a ways to go. Nobody should have expected more than this in the 2023-24 season.
Anaheim Ducks
2 of 32
Grade: D
Maybe a D is too harsh of a grade for a team that was never supposed to compete for a playoff spot. But it isn't necessarily the result that is problematic here; it's the overall lack of progress.
The Ducks finished with just one more point than they had a year ago, Trevor Zegras had what amounted to a lost season, and they were still one of the worst teams in the NHL across the board.
The playoff drought is now at six seasons, and it doesn't seem to be any closer to ending even with a pretty impressive crop of talent already in the NHL and just starting to enter the league.
They need to take a bigger step forward next season.
Boston Bruins
3 of 32
Grade: A
The Bruins were a bit of a mystery entering the season. Sure, they won 65 games a year ago and set an NHL record for most regular-season wins, but they also lost quite a bit of talent from that team including each of its top-two centers.
Boston also didn't bring in a lot from outside the organization to help replace it.
In the end, it didn't really matter as the Bruins were again one of the NHL's best teams and cruised to a playoff spot in a tough Atlantic Division.
There were some flaws, especially with their defensive play, but Charlie Coyle and Pavel Zacha did a solid job taking on increased roles down the middle and the goalie duo of Linus Ullmark and Jeremy Swayman remains one of the best in the league.
The Bruins may not be as good as the 2022-23 team on paper, but they have a strong chance to go further in the playoffs.
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Buffalo Sabres
4 of 32
Grade: D
What an underwhelming and disappointing season this turned out to be.
This was supposed to be the year when the playoff drought ended. Instead, it was extended to a 13th consecutive season while the Sabres got seven points worse in the standings and drifted further away from a postseason spot.
Even worse, a lot of the excitement and positive vibes that existed throughout the 2022-23 season seemed to completely evaporate.
Buffalo went from being one of the NHL's best offensive teams a year ago all the way down to 22nd this season, while its promising young defense struggled to find consistency.
It ended up costing head coach Don Granato his job and leaves the Sabres entering another offseason full of uncertainty and questions. There's still a lot of talent here, but they are at a point when it's time to actually do something with it.
Calgary Flames
5 of 32
Grade: D
It has been consistent downward trajectory for the Flames the past couple of years, and this one resulted in a massive sell-off at the trade deadline that saw them trade Elias Lindholm, Chris Tanev and Noah Hanifin for future picks and prospects.
The biggest problem here is that they still are not getting their money's worth out of Jonathan Huberdeau. Their best chance for a return to the playoffs this season was going to rest largely on his ability to bounce back after a brutal debut season in Calgary. He didn't. And if he isn't scoring as he did in Florida, there's not much else he is going to do to help your team. This is starting to look like it might be the worst contract in the NHL.
Another big concern: Starting goalie Jacob Markstrom actually did bounce back a bit with a .013 increase in his save percentage from a year ago, but the Flames still ended up getting significantly worse in the standings.
When your goaltending gets better and your team gets worse, that's not a good look for anybody.
Carolina Hurricanes
6 of 32
Grade: A
The Hurricanes did what they always do in the regular season and were simply one of the NHL's best teams with almost no weaknesses anywhere on the roster.
They control possession, they defend well, they piece together a formidable goaltending unit and their offense actually finished with its best goal-scoring finish during this six-year run. They also made two huge trade-deadline additions to strengthen their roster, adding Jake Guentzel from the Pittsburgh Penguins and Evgeny Kuznetsov from the Washington Capitals.
Those are all-in moves, with Guentzel being exactly the type of player they might need to get over the hump.
They need more top-line finishers to turn their territorial advantage into consistent goals, and they need somebody with a track record for scoring big goals in the playoffs. Guentzel does both.
This could be their best team yet. Now they just have to do it in the playoffs.
Chicago Blackhawks
7 of 32
Grade: C
This is a "you did what you were expected to do" C. It wasn't a good season by any stretch of the imagination, but it wasn't any worse than anyone expected it to be.
The only thing that really mattered for the Blackhawks this season was seeing some of their young talent develop. And they got that in a big way.
No. 1 overall pick Connor Bedard matched the hype when he was on the ice, and they saw some promising results from young defenders Alex Vlasic and Kevin Korchinski. That trio is their foundation. Now they have to add around them.
Everything else on the roster? Well, it simply wasn't good enough and they have a long way to go to get back to relevance. This has to be a major building offseason.
Colorado Avalanche
8 of 32
Grade: B
The most impressive thing about this Avalanche team is that it won 49 games and tallied 105 points in the standings despite getting some inconsistent— and at times truly bad— goaltending.
That might be their ultimate undoing in the playoffs, but we are only looking at regular-season play here and the Avalanche were able to overcome it in a big way.
The goaltending is also the only thing that made this a B instead of an A.
Nathan MacKinnon played like an MVP, they had two 100-point scorers and Cale Makar was great again in leading the defense. They also made a shrewd trade at the deadline to deal from a position of strength (defense) and send Bowen Byram to Buffalo to fill a major position of weakness (second-line center) with Casey Mittelstadt.
Not addressing the goaltending might come back to haunt them, though.
Columbus Blue Jackets
9 of 32
Grade: F
Just an embarrassing season from the start in Columbus, and it ultimately cost general manager Jarmo Kekäläinen his job.
They spent big money on the wrong players (Johnny Gaudreau and Erik Gudbranson a year ago; Damon Severson and Ivan Provorov this season), they tried to give Mike Babcock a chance to revive his career and ended up getting humiliated. And they went on to be one of the worst teams in the league that did not even come close to challenging for a playoff spot.
There is an excellent farm system here and some young talent coming through the pipeline and Adam Fantilli has a chance to be a superstar, but they need to prove they can develop all of that into something that resembles a competitive hockey team.
It was pretty clear it was not going to happen under the previous front office. Now they have to find the right front office that can do it.
Dallas Stars
10 of 32
Grade: A
The Stars might have the best roster in the NHL from top-to-bottom, and they played like it during the regular season by winning a tough Central Division and finishing as the top seed in the Western Conference.
It was especially impressive given the fact that starting Jake Oettinger did not always play up to his potential. It didn't matter, though, because the rest of the team was so good.
The Stars have one of the deepest forward groups in the NHL and managed to add to it with the shrewd free-agent signing of Matt Duchene, while second-year forward Wyatt Johnston took a huge step forward. Add all of that to a core of Jason Robertson, Roope Hintz, Joe Pavelski, Jamie Benn and Tyler Seguin, and you have one of the most imposing offensive lineups in the league.
It Oettinger plays to his potential in the playoffs, this team will be an extraordinarily tough out.
Detroit Red Wings
11 of 32
Grade: C
There were a lot of things to like about this Red Wings team and a lot of things to not like about it.
On the positive side, they did take a big step forward and become a serious playoff contender. They also had an outstanding offense that was playoff-caliber and capable of beating any team on any given night.
On the negative side, they let a potential playoff spot slip away in a wide-open Eastern Conference because they could not defend or get any consistent goaltending. That aspect of the team was capable of losing to anybody on any given night.
Making matters worse, general manager Steve Yzerman did not improve the defense or goaltending in advance of the trade deadline. There might not have been a trade to make that would have turned them into a Cup contender this season, but they might have been able to at least snap their playoff drought and give their young core some meaningful big-game experience.
They got close this season. The pressure is going to be on to actually get there next season.
Edmonton Oilers
12 of 32
Grade: B
After a 3-9-1 start, the Oilers fired head coach Jay Woodcroft and replaced him with Kris Knoblauch and then finished the year on a 46-18-5 run.
It would be pretty easy to use that coaching change as the turning point of the season, but even during their slow start under Woodcroft there were signs that they would improve. Their 5-on-5 underlying and possession numbers were among the best in the NHL, and they were getting sunk by horrible goaltending.
It was the decision to cut the cord on Jack Campbell and move forward with Stuart Skinner that was the real turning point in the campaign.
And it's not like Skinner was anything special, and he still might be the biggest question mark going into the playoffs. But he at least gave them competent goaltending and didn't outright lose many games for them the way Campbell did. That is pretty much all this team needs to have a chance.
They are good enough offensively and dictate the pace of games enough that they just need somebody in net to not give games away.
Florida Panthers
13 of 32
Grade: A
The Panthers showed that their run to the Stanley Cup Final a year ago was no fluke. They came back even stronger this season and had the look of a legitimate contender from day one while also winning one of the league's toughest divisions.
They did so despite having some big injury issues at times and with Matthew Tkachuk's production taking a bit of a dip.
Overall there is not really a major weakness here.
They are a top offensive team, they improved their defensive play from a year ago, and the duo of Sergei Bobrovsky and Anthony Stolarz gave them elite goaltending all year.
It would not be a surprise to see this team back in the Stanley Cup Final and this time winning it all.
Los Angeles Kings
14 of 32
Grade: B
Just an overall solid season, even if their point total did regress by a few in the standings.
The Kings were one of the league's elite defensive teams, received better goaltending than maybe anybody expected and got a big breakout season from 2020 No. 2 overall pick Quinton Byfield.
The Pierre-Luc Dubois trade and contract is looking like a questionable move at this point, and they are going to need a lot more out of him in the playoffs and in the coming seasons, but there is a lot to like about this team and the way it plays.
They just have one big problem: They are kind of stuck as a mid-level Western Conference team and have a brutally tough first-round matchup against the Edmonton Oilers (again).
They have established themselves as a playoff team. Now they have to take the next step.
Minnesota Wild
15 of 32
Grade: C
The Wild took a big step backward from where they were a year ago and missed the playoffs in the Western Conference, but this team has been working with a major salary-cap disadvantage the past couple of years due to the costly Zach Parise and Ryan Suter buyouts.
That has greatly limited their ability to build a complete roster.
Overall, there was not much that changed with Minnesota this season in terms of its style of play. Its 5-on-5 numbers and defensive metrics were nearly identical to what it did a year ago, while the usual suspects (specifically Kirill Kaprizov) led the offense.
What did change, though, was the goaltending.
The duo of Filip Gustavsson and Marc-Andre Fleury masked a lot of flaws and shortcomings and finished as one of the most productive pairings in the 2022-23 season.
They pretty much did a 180 with their performance this season and were one of the least productive duos in the league. That was enough to take the Wild from the playoffs to the 10th-best team in the Western Conference.
Montreal Canadiens
16 of 32
Grade: C+
Yes, it was another last-place finish in what was another rebuilding year for the Canadiens.
But they did improve by eight points, and most importantly they started to get a glimpse of what a fully healthy Juraj Slafkovsky can be in the NHL.
The 2022 No. 1 overall pick played like a legitimate top-line player in the second half of the season and has the look of a player who is going to be a cornerstone piece in the coming seasons. He may not be a superstar on the Sidney Crosby or Connor McDavid level, but he should be one heck of a player for the next decade.
Slafkovsky, Nick Suzuki and Cole Caufield look like a really strong trio of players to build around. They still need a lot more around them, and that is going to take some time, but they do at least have some key pieces locked in. It's a start.
Nashville Predators
17 of 32
Grade: B
For the first three-quarters of the season, the Predators looked like the same mediocre team they had been the previous couple of years. Not quite good enough to contend or make the playoffs, but not quite bad enough to fully commit to a rebuild.
Then, with around 28 games to play in the regular season, something sudden clicked for them and they went on a tear down the stretch to not only make the playoffs but also jump into the first first wild-card spot.
And they did all of that while getting a mostly ordinary season from starting goalie Juuse Saros.
The big game-changer this season was a fully healthy Filip Forsberg and Roman Josi having monster years (48 goals and 94 total points for Forsberg; 85 total points for Josi) combined with big years from free agent signings Ryan O'Reilly and Gustav Nyquist.
They might not be a Stanley Cup contender and may not have a lot of high-end talent, but they defend well, do not have many weaknesses and have a goalie (Saros) who can go on a roll at any moment and carry them.
New Jersey Devils
18 of 32
Grade: F
There is no way to sugarcoat this. This was a completely wasted season for the core of a team that should have been a Stanley Cup contender.
Injuries to Jack Hughes, Nico Hischier and especially Dougie Hamilton played a part in their struggles, but even when all three were healthy, the team still did not fully play up to its potential.
Head coach Lindy Ruff was guilty of bizarre player usage and decision-making before he was fired, and some young players did not fully develop as hoped.
The biggest failing here has to fall with the front office for willingly rolling into the season with Vitek Vanecek and Akira Schmid as an unproven and questionable goaltending duo, and then not doing anything to fix it until it became too late in the year.
This is still a talented team with a great young core, it should still have a wide-open window for contention in front of it, but this season turned out to be a complete waste. A well-earned and richly deserved F.
New York Islanders
19 of 32
Grade: C+
The New York Islanders deserve credit for making the playoffs and grabbing the third spot in the Metropolitan Division. But what do they really do well? How good are they?
They ranked 22nd in goals per game, 18th in goals against per game, 19th on the power play, 32nd on the penalty kill, 19th in shots on goal per game, 29th in shots on goal against per game and 19th in expected goals share per 60 minutes.
That is a below-average team across the board.
They only won 39 games (18th in the league), with only 29 of them coming in regulation (23rd in the league). Overall, they actually lost two more games than they won for the season.
They got hot at the end of the season and went on a roll to grab a playoff spot away from a bunch of teams that faded at the same time. Credit to them for playing well in crunch time when other teams didn't. But it is still a pretty average (at best) team.
New York Rangers
20 of 32
Grade: A
The New York Rangers still have some flaws when it comes to their 5-on-5 play, but when you win the Presidents' Trophy and finish with the best record in the NHL, it's hard to give you anything other than an A.
They have an elite power play, Igor Shesterkin was dominant in goal over the final three months of the regular season, and they have top-tier players at forward (Artemi Panarin) and defense (Adam Fox).
They also got a much-needed breakout year from 2020 No. 1 overall pick Alexis Lafrenière.
This could be their best shot at a serious Stanley Cup run with this core. They need to take advantage of it.
Ottawa Senators
21 of 32
Grade: D
The Senators did that thing about where they dig themselves in a deep hole for the majority of the season and then start winning games at the end when it's too late to make a difference.
This was always a top-heavy team offensively with some major questions when it came to its depth, defense and goaltending.
Those questions did not have positive answers.
The offense was again extremely top-heavy, and even worse, Tim Stutzle and Brady Tkachuk did not score the way they did a year ago.
The Senators were one of the worst defensive teams in the league and made a costly investment in the wrong goalie by signing Joonas Korpisalo to a long-term deal in free agency. His first year with the team resulted in him being one of the least productive goalies in the league.
Philadelphia Flyers
22 of 32
Grade: C
What a weird season this turned out to be for the Flyers.
They started the year with zero expectations and looked like one of the worst teams in the NHL. Then they stormed out of the gate and built themselves a huge cushion in the Metropolitan Division playoff race.
Then everything started to fall apart right around the time starting goalie Carter Hart left the team after facing sexual assault charges in Canada. Their goaltending was a mess after that, and head coach John Tortorella ran out of answers in the second half.
It is hard to be too critical of them for missing the playoffs when nobody expected them to make it at the beginning of the year, but they had a spot seemingly locked down three-quarters of the way through the season.
Losing it the way they did is a brutal result. But it was still a significantly better season than anybody could have expected from them.
Pittsburgh Penguins
23 of 32
Grade: D
Pittsburgh Penguins captain Sidney Crosby has not missed a game in two years and is still playing at an absurdly high level given he is 36 years old. Despite that, two different front offices were unable to build a playoff team around him.
This team had scoring depth issues, a power-play unit that underachieved so badly that it finished 30th in the NHL despite being loaded with future Hall of Famers, and they also lost seven games (five in regulation, two in overtime) when leading after two periods.
Over the final month of the regular season where they were desperately fighting for a playoff spot, they lost a game where they led 4-0 in Colorado, a 3-1 in the third period in Columbus, and then allowed Detroit to get a huge point against them by losing a 5-3 lead with seven minutes to play.
At other points in the season, they lost a 2-0 third period lead in Vegas and failed to get a point, they lost a three-goal lead in Buffalo to lose in regulation and turned a 3-1 third-period lead in Calgary into a 4-3 regulation loss.
That's to say nothing of a game early in the year against Anaheim where they had a two-minute, 5-on-3 power play in the final two minutes of a tied game and failed to even get a point. They also turned a 2-0 lead in their season opener into a 4-2 regulation loss against the Chicago Blackhawks. All of those games added up.
It was a lousy, disappointing season full of missed opportunities for a team that still had playoff goals and should have had the talent to get there.
San Jose Sharks
24 of 32
Grade: D
Even for a team that was supposed to be bad as part of its rebuild this season was a little embarrassing at times.
They weren't just bad, they failed to even be competitive from the very start.
The Sharks opened the season with 10 consecutive losses, including a pair of defeats where they gave up 10 goals in back-to-back games.
Overall, they had four different nine-game losing streaks, including two that went beyond 10 games.
This team is years away from even competing for a playoff spot. Settle in, Sharks fans, because this is going to be an extensive rebuild.
Seattle Kraken
25 of 32
Grade: D
There were a lot of reasons to be somewhat skeptical of the Seattle Kraken coming into this season, with the biggest reason being the fact that so much of their success a year ago was dependent on one of the highest shooting percentages in the league.
It was simply never a roster that was likely to repeat that sort of success offensively.
And it didn't.
The Kraken took a disturbing step backward this season and went from the second round of the playoffs to missing the postseason by 17 points.
The biggest disappointment might have been the regression from second-year player (and reigning Rookie of the Year) Matty Beniers. He and Shane Wright are need to be stars for the Kraken to become Stanley Cup contenders. It hasn't happened yet, though.
St. Louis Blues
26 of 32
Grade: C-
This season probably was not as good as it looked in the standings.
The Blues offense regressed for the second year in a row, and they still had major issues defensively that have not been corrected or meaningfully addressed in years. The only thing that really kept them in the playoff race was the fact that they got better-than-expected goaltending from Jordan Binnington and Joel Hofer.
That is probably not something they will be able to confidently rely on again next season.
The bigger problem is that there is no easy way to fix those defensive issues given how bad some of those contracts are for Colton Parayko, Justin Faulk, Torey Krug and Nick Leddy.
The Blues are in the NHL's middle ground and that is extremely difficult to climb out of.
Tampa Bay Lightning
27 of 32
Grade: B-
The Lightning are definitely not the team they were a few years ago when they were in the middle of three consecutive trips to the Stanley Cup Final.
But it's still a really strong team.
They were a top-five team offensively and finished the regular season with 98 points despite getting some of the league's worst goaltending.
The usually reliable Andrei Vasilevskiy missed the first month of the season as he recovered from offseason surgery and then never really found his groove. The Lightning finished the season with an .896 save percentage as a team, which was not only the worst among the 16 playoff teams, it was 28th in the NHL.
They were one of only three teams in the bottom 15 in save percentage to actually make the playoffs.
It was a testament to how good the rest of the team was that the Lightning were able to overcome that level of goaltending and still finish as strongly as they did.
Toronto Maple Leafs
28 of 32
Grade: C+
Despite getting a 69-goal season from Auston Matthews and monster offensive performances from William Nylander (40 goals, 98 total points) and Mitch Marner (26 goals, 85 points in only 69 games) this season still felt pretty ordinary for the Maple Leafs. Certainly nothing truly special.
It was another third-place finish in the Atlantic Division, they finished with the 10th-best overall record in the league (good, but not great), had a lousy defense, terrible goaltending and just seem to be a step below some of the league's top Cup contenders.
It is eight years together for this core, and they still haven't really been an elite team.
The pressure is still on them to do something in the playoffs, and they have a brutally tough draw by getting the Boston Bruins in the first round again. If they lose that series and have another first-round exit, it's going to be long past time to start asking significant questions of this core and team overall.
Vancouver Canucks
29 of 32
Grade: A
The Canucks are by no means a perfect team, but man, are they fun to watch and easy to get excited about. They not only returned to the playoffs for just the second time in nine years, but they also won the Pacific Division and had some huge seasons from their top players.
Elias Pettersson, J.T. Miller and Brock Boeser were all great at forward, while defenseman Quinn Hughes put together a Norris Trophy-worthy season.
The biggest game-changer, though, might have been the play of starting goalie Thatcher Demko who had a career year and played like a legit No. 1 netminder.
All of that together gave the Canucks just their third 50-win season in franchise history and put them back on the map as a relevant team.
Vegas Golden Knights
30 of 32
Grade: B-
The defending Stanley Cup champions opened the year with a 11-0-1 start that made them look like a legitimate challenger to win a second consecutive title.
After that start? They were a very ordinary 34-29-7 the rest of the way and finished as the second wild-card team in the Western Conference.
Injuries played a big role in that, but the overall performance still left something to be desired.
The Golden Knights were also up to their old salary-cap tricks to position themselves to be major buyers at the trade deadline, adding Anthony Mantha, Tomas Hertl and Noah Hanifin.
That was some shrewd roster and salary-cap management (even if it angered other fans around the league), but it also no doubt increased expectations for the playoffs.
Washington Capitals
31 of 32
Grade: C
This is a very similar situation as the New York Islanders.
Yeah, you made the playoffs and did enough at the end of the season to get in. But you also got outscored by 37 goals during the regular season, giving you the worst goal differential of any playoff team since the 1990-91 season.
There isn't really anything they do particularly well.
Charlie Lindgren ended up playing the biggest role in salvaging the season by taking over the No. 1 goalie spot, while Alex Ovechkin got hot in the second half to help turn around a power-play unit that had been awful earlier in the season.
The fact that they are even in the playoffs with that goal differential, as well as the fact that they were sellers at the trade deadline (dealing away Anthony Mantha and Evgeny Kuznetsov) is a wild development.
Winnipeg Jets
32 of 32
Grade: B+
Starting goalie Connor Hellebuyck gets an A for being one of the biggest game-changers in the league. He has not only been the best goalie in the NHL this season, but he should also be an easy finalist for the MVP award. Maybe even the winner.
The rest of the team beyond him has its flaws, both in terms of overall scoring depth and its defensive play, and is probably more in the B or C range.
Elite goaltending can completely change the outlook of a team and its ceiling, and this is the best possible example of that.
The Jets were only 16th in the league in scoring this season and only have one player in the top 50 for scoring (Mark Scheifele at No. 49), while they were 14th in the league in expected goals against per 60 minutes of 5-on-5 play.
With average goaltending, they might be a fringe playoff team and the same mediocre team they have been in recent years. Hellebuyck has helped turn them into a contender in a wide-open Western Conference.
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