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The NHL playoffs open Saturday afternoon with the Ottawa Senators visiting the Carolina Hurricanes, while the Edmonton Oilers and the Montreal Canadiens are also in the running to become the first Canadian team to hoist the Stanley Cup sincethe Habs in 1993.
Here’s a quick look at the three first-round series involving a Canadian club, plus a bit on each of the five all-U.S. matchups.
Ottawa vs. Carolina (starts Saturday at 3 p.m. ET)
As the lower of the two Eastern Conference wild cards, the Senators are obviously clear underdogs against the top-seeded Hurricanes, who won the Metropolitan Division in a landslide and finished with the second-best record in the league, behind Colorado.
But Ottawa has been one of the NHL’s top teams since March 1, going 15-5-3 while Carolina was 15-7-1. Also, the betting markets suggest this series could be closer than it looks, with the current series odds implying the ‘Canes have around a 60 per cent chance of taking it. By comparison, Western top seed Colorado’s implied odds of winning its opening-round series are around 80 per cent.
To upset high-scoring Carolina, the Sens will need up-and-down goalie Linus Ullmark to be the best version of himself. The 2023 Vezina Trophy winner struggled over the first three months of the season before taking a 16-game leave of absence for mental-health reasons, and Ottawa sank to last place in the East in mid-January. But, since returning at the end of that month, Ullmark is 14-4-3 with a fantastic 2.30 goals-against average, helping his team overcome a 10-point deficit to reach the playoffs.
Montreal vs. Tampa Bay (starts Sunday at 5:45 p.m ET)
The Canadiens and the Lightning finished with the same number of points (106) in the same division (the Atlantic). And yet, Tampa Bay is nearly a 70 per cent betting favourite to win their series. Why?
Well, the Bolts earned six more regulation-time wins than the Habs, giving them second place in the division and home-ice advantage for a potential Game 7 against third-place Montreal. The Lightning also have the much better recent playoff track record, winning back-to-back Stanley Cups in 2020 and 2021 and reaching a third straight final in 2022 with close to the same core of players they still have.
They’re also loaded with established star forwards like Nikita Kucherov (second in the league with 130 points), Brayden Point, Brandon Hagel and Jake Guentzel; and goalie Andrei Vasilevskiy is favoured to win his second Vezina.
However, aging Tampa got bounced in the first round in each of the last three years. And don’t count out the up-and-coming Canadiens, who improved by 15 points last year to earn a surprising wild-card berth (they lost in the first round too) and added another 15 this season to stay in the tough Atlantic race right to the end.
Twenty-six-year-old captain Nick Suzuki became the first Montreal player in 40 years to reach the 100-point mark, while 25-year-old sniper Cole Caufield is the first Hab in 36 years to score 50 goals, finishing just two behind Rocket Richard Trophy winner Nathan MacKinnon with 51. Twenty-two-year-old defenceman Lane Hutson had 78 points, including 66 assists to match Larry Robinson’s record for a Habs blue-liner.
The NHL playoffs kick off April 18, and the Montreal Canadiens have secured their spot. Here’s a look at how they got there and what their chances are of winning it all.
Edmonton vs. Anaheim (starts Monday at 10 p.m. ET)
The Oilers, who finished one point ahead of the Ducks for second place in the weak Pacific Division, will try for their third straight trip to the Stanley Cup final after back-to-back losses to Florida.
The good news is the Panthers, who overpowered Edmonton in six games last year, failed to reach the playoffs. And the Oilers once again drew a favourable path to the final as they won’t have to face any of the top three teams in the West — Colorado, Dallas and Minnesota, who all play in the ferocious Central Division — until the conference final. Plus, star forward Leon Draisaitl, out for the last month with a lower-body injury, is expected back at some point in the first round, maybe even Game 1.
Draisaitl’s return is essential for the Oilers to have a chance at winning their first Stanley Cup of the Connor McDavid era, which is now in its 11th season. The 29-year-old wrapped up his sixth scoring title last night, moving him into a tie with Mario Lemieux and Gordie Howe for the second-most Art Ross Trophies ever, trailing only Wayne Gretzky’s 10. But McDavid is still searching for his first championship, while Lemieux won two and Gretzky and Howe nabbed four apiece. None of them won a Cup past the age of 27, so the clock is definitely ticking.
The Edmonton Oilers are hoping to reach the Stanley Cup finals for the third year in a row. Host of Real Talk podcast Ryan Jesperson shares his thoughts on what may lie ahead for the Oilers in this year’s playoff run.
The other matchups
Buffalo vs. Boston (starts Sunday at 7:30 p.m. ET): Buffalo is famous for two things: chicken wings and its rabid, table-smashing Bills fans. But it’s a great hockey town, too, and the arena will be shaking for the Sabres’ first playoff game in 15 years. Buffalo was tied for the worst record in the East on Dec. 15 before going an NHL-best 36-9-5 the rest of the way to win the Atlantic Division. The wild-card Bruins are back after missing the playoffs last season for the first time in eight years.
Pittsburgh vs. Philadelphia (starts Saturday at 8 p.m. ET): After missing the playoffs for three straight years, the aging Penguins finished a surprising second in the Metropolitan Division, one spot ahead of the Flyers. Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin and Kris Letang are almost a decade removed from the last of their three Cup victories together, but they have a good chance to advance against Metro rival Philly, whose league-high 10 shootout wins helped them duck into the playoffs.
Colorado vs. Los Angeles (starts Sunday at 3 p.m. ET): The high-scoring Avalanche ran away with the Presidents’ Trophy, finishing with eight more points and six more regulation wins than anyone else in the NHL. They also scored the most goals, gave up the fewest, and their plus-99 goal differential topped the league by a whopping 40.
MacKinnon, Cale Makar and company shouldn’t have much trouble with a Kings team that tied for 30th in the league in regulation wins despite playing in the cushy Pacific. The bigger question is, can the Avs become the first Presidents’ winner to capture the Cup since Chicago in 2013?
Dallas vs. Minnesota (starts Saturday at 5:30 p.m. ET): You’ve gotta feel for these two. They finished with the third- and seventh-best records in the entire league, respectively. But, thanks to the NHL’s insane playoff format, they have to battle each other in the first round. And the reward for the survivor? A likely second-round date with Colorado. The Stars’ Wyatt Johnston and Jason Robertson each scored 45 goals this season while the Wild’s Kirill Kaprizov and Matt Boldy combined for 87. Star defenceman Quinn Hughes makes his playoff debut for Minnesota following his December trade from league-worst Vancouver.
Vegas vs. Utah (starts Sunday at 10 p.m. ET): Fun fact about the wild-card Mammoth, who are in the playoffs for the first time since the Arizona Coyotes dissolved and reconstituted as an expansion franchise in Salt Lake City in 2024: they’re the first team since the introduction of the shootout two decades ago to go a full 82-game season without participating in one. The Golden Knights could only wish: they went a dismal 1-8 in the shootout. But there are none of those in the playoffs, and Vegas is on a roll since firing Bruce Cassidy and bringing in fiery John Tortorella, winning seven of its eight games since the coaching change to surge to the Pacific title.
Here’s the complete schedule for Round 1.
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