The 2021-22 NHL regular season officially began Tuesday night with the Tampa Bay Lightning raising their second-straight Stanley Cup banner, as well as the Seattle Kraken playing in the franchise's first game against the Vegas Golden Knights.
As for the Buffalo Sabres, they will open their 2021-22 season on Thursday night with a matchup with the Stanley Cup runner up, Montreal Canadiens at KeyBank Center.
So, how does the league stack up as the season begins? Here are our power rankings of all 32 teams:
32.) Buffalo Sabres
The Sabres got an excellent haul from the Philadelphia Flyers for Rasmus Ristolainen and a good one from the Florida Panthers for Sam Reinhart, but they also lost their best goalie, Linus Ullmark, for nothing and didn’t really make any meaningful additions. They’re back into full rebuild mode, with the conclusion of the Jack Eichel saga still to come at some point.
31.) Arizona Coyotes
The Coyotes are also in full rebuild mode this season, not to be confused with full relocation mode. They got theirs off to a pretty good start by piling up draft picks through a major summer sell-off, while also getting out from under Oliver Ekman-Larsson’s albatross of a contract.
30.) Anaheim Ducks
Anaheim stunk last year and basically did nothing this offseason. I don’t know what else to tell you. At least Trevor Zegras is fun.
29.) Columbus Blue Jackets
The Blue Jackets had the fourth-worst record in the NHL last season. They didn’t really tear it down to the studs despite trading Seth Jones, but they certainly didn’t get better either. So putting them fourth-worst again makes sense.
28.) San Jose Sharks
They upgraded their goaltending by dumping Martin Jones and adding James Reimer and Adin Hill. Nick Bonino was a nice signing, too, but this is still a team that’s going nowhere fast and seems to be caught in no-man’s land. Who knows when or if the under-investigation Evander Kane plays another game for them.
27.) Ottawa Senators
The Senators have some good young talent to build around, and they played pretty well down the stretch last year in the horrible North Division. They still need to get Brady Tkachuk signed, though, as they have allowed this situation to drag on far longer than it should have.
26.) Detroit Red Wings
General manager Steve Yzerman did some good business this summer by adding goalie Alex Nedeljkovic, defenseman Nick Leddy and center Pius Suter. The Red Wings definitely aren’t ready to make a playoff push yet, but like the Senators, there are finally, at least, signs that things are starting to get better. Losing Jakub Vrana for four months to injury definitely hurts, though.
25.) Nashville Predators
The Predators are clearly starting a rebuild after trading away Ryan Ellis and Viktor Arvidsson, but they also still have enough talent to stay away from the basement, including one of the best goalies in the league in Juuse Saros.
24.) Calgary Flames
23.) Vancouver Canucks
22.) Los Angeles Kings
We’re going to lump these three Pacific Division teams together. Any one of them could make a run at a playoff spot in the NHL’s weakest division, but none of them are anything special. The Kings have a bright future and did the smartest offseason business of the three by adding Phillip Danault, Arvidsson and Alex Edler.
The Canucks did the most business, dumping several bad contracts in the trade that landed them Conor Garland (thumbs up) but also an even worse contract in Ekman-Larsson (thumbs down). I’m not convinced they actually got any better. Same goes for the Flames, who improved up front with the signing of Blake Coleman (even if the contract was a sizable overpay), but got weaker on defense with the loss of Mark Giordano to the Seattle Kraken.
21.) Montreal Canadiens
What to make of the Canadiens? They were a below-average team last regular season, but then went on a run all the way to the Stanley Cup Final. Then they lost Shea Weber, Phillip Danault, Tomas Tatar and Corey Perry while only adding Christian Dvorak, Mike Hoffman and a couple depth pieces. Most recently, Carey Price has taken a leave of absence.
Put it all together, add in the fact that they’re back in a much tougher division and conference, and the Canadiens look like a team that’s more likely to miss the playoffs than make them this year.
20.) New Jersey Devils
The Devils definitely got better this offseason, adding defensemen Dougie Hamilton and Ryan Graves, Tatar and goalie Jonathan Bernier. If young centers Jack Hughes and Nico Hischier make a jump, a playoff push isn’t out of the question. But let’s not get too excited just yet - the Devils did have the third-worst record in the NHL last season.
19.) Philadelphia Flyers
The Flyers were certainly busy this offseason, making one great trade with Nashville for Ellis, one baffling one with Buffalo for Ristolainen, and one fairly lateral move by swapping Jakub Voracek for Cam Atkinson with Columbus. Whether it’ll be enough to turn things around after a disappointing playoff miss will hinge largely on whether 23-year-old goalie Carter Hart can bounce back after an absolutely abysmal season.
18.) New York Rangers
The Rangers were on a promising rebuild path, but a combination of impatience from ownership and overreaction to Tom Wilson’s late-season antics resulted in an offseason blowup that saw the general manager and coach fired and one of their best players, Pavel Buchnevich, moved out to make room for the grit and toughness of Barclay Goodrow and Ryan Reaves.
Stars like Artemi Panarin, Adam Fox and Mika Zibanejad - plus a possible second-year breakout from Alexis Lafrienere - will keep the Rangers afloat and somewhere around the playoff race, but it feels like their chances of making a real jump took a hit.
17.) Chicago Blackhawks
Another big-market team that was extremely active this offseason.
They traded away franchise mainstay Duncan Keith, who has been in decline, and went out and got Seth Jones to be their new No. 1 defenseman, something he still has the potential to be despite a tough season last year. They made another big splash by acquiring reigning Vezina Trophy winner Marc-Andre Fleury, a move that should give them one of the league’s best goalie tandems with Kevin Lankinen. Losing Pius Suter hurts, but the return of Jonathan Toews, a healthy Kirby Dach and the addition of Tyler Johnson should shore up the center position.
They’ll be better and could be right in the thick of the playoff mix.
16.) St. Louis Blues
The Blues have had a ton of turnover since winning the Stanley Cup in 2019, and that continued this offseason with the departures of Vince Dunn, Jaden Schwartz and Hoffman (who was not on the Stanley Cup team, but who was pretty good last year). They, arguably, got better up front, though, by acquiring Buchnevich and Brandon Saad and - against all odds - hanging onto Vladimir Tarasenko. But the defense got worse with no Dunn replacement, and that seriously limits their potential to be anything more than a middle-of-the-road team again.
15.) Dallas Stars
The Stars went from the Stanley Cup Final in 2020 to missing the playoffs last season. There’s some bounce-back potential if Tyler Seguin and Alex Radulov can return to form after both missed nearly all of last season. Signing Ryan Suter makes up for losing Jamie Oleksiak and helps keep the defensive corps a strength. They have four goalies if Ben Bishop returns at some point; they should be able to get good play from at least two of them.
The concern would be that this is an older team, and some key declines aren’t out of the question.
14.) Seattle Kraken
The Kraken don’t have much in the way of high-end star power, and it’s a bit surprising that they passed on a few chances to add some via the Expansion Draft or trades.
What they do have, though, is excellent depth, very good goaltending with Philipp Grubauer and Chris Driedger, and no real weaknesses. That should be enough to, at least, make the playoffs in their first season, especially given how weak the Pacific Division is. Don’t expect a Vegas-like run to the Stanley Cup Final, though.
13.) Carolina Hurricanes
The Hurricanes have looked like a team on the verge of being a true Stanley Cup contender for the last few years, but they took a sizable step backwards this offseason. They let a Norris contender in Hamilton walk in free agency, and they made a baffling choice to move on from both Alex Nedeljkovic and Petr Mrazek in net, only to downgrade the position by replacing them with Frederik Andersen and Antti Raanta.
There is still enough talent here - led by the likes of Sebastian Aho, Andrei Svechnikov and Jaccob Slavin - to make the playoffs, but they no longer look like a team that can challenge the elite.
12.) Minnesota Wild
The Wild were one of the league’s big surprises last season, finishing with one of the 10 best records and taking Vegas to seven games in the playoffs. They still have a deep group of forwards, and getting Kirill Kaprizov locked up was huge. Losing Suter and Carson Soucy on defense will hurt, though, and the Cam Talbot-Kaapo Kahkonen goalie tandem remains difficult to trust.
11.) Winnipeg Jets
The Jets needed to improve their defense and did by replacing Derek Forbort and Tucker Poolman with Nate Schmidt and Brenden Dillon. Losing Mason Appleton and Mathieu Perreault hurts their forward depth, but the upgrades on the blue line should offset that. Oh, and they still have Connor Hellebuyck in net.
No one in the Central Division seems particularly close to truly challenging the Avalanche, but the Jets may be the closest of the not-so-close.
10.) Edmonton Oilers
The Oilers had one of the busiest offseasons in the league.
They finally improved their forward depth behind Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl by signing a very good winger in Zach Hyman, even though they definitely overpaid for him. They also added a pair of solid third-liners in Warren Foegele and Derek Ryan. The defense looks as shaky as ever, though, unless newly acquired Keith, now 38-years-old, can find a fountain of youth after several years of decline. Trusting 39-year-old goalie Mike Smith to replicate what he did last season is risky as well.
9.) Washington Capitals
Similar to the Boston Bruins and the next team on this list, it feels like the rest of the league keeps waiting for the Capitals’ aging core to fall off a cliff, and it just doesn’t happen.
Maybe it finally started when they limped into the playoffs last year and lost to the Bruins in five games in the first round, but let's not write off the likes of Alex Ovechkin, Nicklas Backstrom (who will miss at least the first 10 games), T.J. Oshie and John Carlson until we see that happen for more than a couple weeks.
The one area that’s definitely concerning, though, is the goaltending, as the Capitals are running back a Vitek Vanecek-Ilya Samsonov tandem that struggled for much of last season.
8.) Pittsburgh Penguins
Speaking of aging cores and questionable goaltending…
The Penguins go into the 2021-22 season with Tristan Jarry and Casey DeSmith in goal again after how last season ended is highly questionable. Perhaps UMass national champion Filip Lindberg will be ready to help at some point.
The Penguins might take a while to get going this season (although they did beat the Lightning Tuesday night), as they’ll be without Evgeni Malkin for the first couple months and without Sidney Crosby for the first handful of games or so.
As long as they can keep their head above water early on, though, they should be there in the end - remember, they actually outplayed the Islanders in the playoffs pretty much everywhere except in goal. Whether they can snap out of their recent trend of losing in the first round is another story, though.
7.) Florida Panthers
For anyone thinking it’s going to be a “Big Three” in the Atlantic Division this season with Tampa Bay, Boston and Toronto, don’t sleep on the Panthers. This is a really good, deep team, led by Aleksander Barkov and Jonathan Huberdeau up front. They also added Reinhart this offseason and get Aaron Ekblad back on the blue line after a broken leg ended his season last year.
The questions are in goal, where the Panthers lost Chris Driedger and will now roll with Sergei Bobrovsky, who has fallen off a cliff since he got there, and a talented but inexperienced Spencer Knight.
6.) Toronto Maple Leafs
The Maple Leafs remain one of the most talented teams in the NHL. They’ll probably have one of the best records, and should easily make the playoffs.
None of it matters until or unless they finally figure out how to get out of the first round. Last year was supposed to be the year. They dominated the weak North Division. They should have been a lock for the final-four. Then they blew a 3-1 series lead to the Canadiens in the first round.
They moved around some parts, probably getting stronger in goal but a little weaker up front. Whatever it does for them in the regular season is completely irrelevant. It’s just about impossible to believe in the Maple Leafs as an actual Stanley Cup contender until they win, at least, one series.
5.) Boston Bruins
Going to be honest: Did not expect to have the Bruins in the top-five before diving into this.
Boston's offseason wasn’t very good. They lost David Krejci and didn’t sign another true No. 2 center. They didn’t really upgrade their defense. The Jeremy Swayman-Linus Ullmark goalie tandem comes with potential, but also some questions. They hope the veteran additions to the third and fourth lines will provide more certainty there and help offset the loss of Krejci specifically.
It’s hard to make the case that the Bruins got better this summer, but pretty much none of the top teams did (welcome to a flat cap world), and they may not have taken as much of a step back as some of the teams around them. They still have, arguably, the best line in the NHL, they brought back Taylor Hall, and they still have an elite defenseman in Charlie McAvoy anchoring the blue line.
4.) New York Islanders
The Islanders have made it to the final-four each of the last two seasons, and there’s little reason to think they won’t be in that conversation again.
They did lose two key players in Jordan Eberle and Leddy, but Anders Lee returns up front after a season-ending knee injury. Noah Dobson should be ready to take on a bigger role on the back end, and Zdeno Chara adds some veteran insurance there as well. Plus, they still have, arguably, the best goalie tandem in the league in Semyon Varlamov and Ilya Sorokin.
3.) Vegas Golden Knights
Re-signing veteran defenseman Alec Martinez was nice. Trading away Marc-Andre Fleury for nothing but cap space right after he won the Vezina Trophy was not. Robin Lehner is a good goalie, but he hasn’t taken on a true No. 1 workload in several years.
The Golden Knights should, once again, be a very good team, but as with all these other top teams, they didn’t really get better and go into the season with question marks.
2.) Colorado Avalanche
The cap-strapped Avalanche lost a lot this offseason: Their starting goalie in Grubauer, two good middle-six forwards in Saad and Joonas Donskoi, and a top-four defenseman in Graves.
They also still have a lot: One of the few lines that can challenge the Bruins’ top line for the title of “best” in Gabriel Landeskog-Nathan MacKinnon-Mikko Rantanen, arguably the best all-around defenseman in the league in Cale Makar, and two other elite defensemen in Devon Toews and Samuel Girard.
New starting goalie Darcy Kuemper should help ease the loss of Grubauer.
1.) Tampa Bay Lightning
Speaking of losing a lot, the Lightning needed to shed a boatload of salary this offseason and lost their entire third line (Blake Coleman, Yanni Gourde and Barclay Goodrow) from these back-to-back Stanley Cup wins, plus Tyler Johnson, as a result.
Like Colorado, they still have a lot, though: Stars like Nikita Kucherov, Steven Stamkos and Brayden Point up front; Victor Hedman, Ryan McDonagh and Mikhail Sergachev leading the blue line; and perennial Vezina candidate Andrei Vasilevskiy in net.
The two-time defending champs are more vulnerable than they’ve been in a couple years, but there’s enough here to keep them on top until someone proves they’re ready to pass them.
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