The Carolina Hurricanes are either the best team in hockey, or the biggest frauds in the Stanley Cup Playoffs — it all depends on who you ask. The Canes made history on Saturday night in Philadelphia with their eighth straight playoff win, and their second sweep in a row. It made them the first team in NHL history to sweep their first two series since the 1987 best-of-seven format began, the first team to start 8-0 in the playoffs since 1985, and only the fifth team in NHL history to start the playoffs 8-0.

Yet nobody can settle on whether this team is really a Stanley Cup favorite yet.

A lot of factors go into the acrimony when discussing Carolina. There’s long-standing bitterness over southern hockey being a thing, especially following back-to-back years of the Florida Panthers hoisting the cup. There’s the fact that the team plays hockey in a manner that runs counter to everything we know about success in the modern NHL. Also, there’s simply a reality that the Canes have had a pretty easy path through the postseason thus far, facing two teams that were bad strategic mismatches for them.

What that doesn’t mean, however, is that either the Ottawa Senators or Philadelphia Flyers are “bad teams.” Finishing with 99 and 98 points on the season, respectively, the Sens and Flyers were better than the entire Western Conference Pacific Division, better than the Utah Mammoth who the Golden Knights beat in the first round, and just one win worse than the Bruins, who the Sabres bested in the opening round. Yet, it’s become cool to hate on the Hurricanes’ opponents thus far as a means to discredit Carolina as being a legitimate team — foisting them with criticism no other team in the field is left with.

It’s absolutely fair to say that both Ottawa and Philadelphia were thrown into a mismatch blender. Both teams thrived during the regular season when playing on clean ice, with open passing lanes and room to set up plays. This is what the Hurricanes excel at stopping, running brutal forechecks with gutsy defensive rotations that flip the formation to send defensemen up ice to hassle opposing defenseman on the puck, allowing the forwards to stay home.

One of the hallmarks of Carolina hockey is to forget the model of play that wins in the NHL, and instead change the game into Hurricanes hockey. They thrive in limiting the effectiveness of star players, making the game be about depth rather than top-line strength, then take over when their third and fourth lines are stronger than their opponents. There’s no coincidence that hockey fans were wondering why Brady Tkachuk and Tim Stützle disappeared in the Sens series, or why Trevor Zegras and Travis Konecny couldn’t make inroads in round two. This was the Canes’ doing, and it worked.

This past week Brady Tkachuk explained why it was near-impossible to deal with the Hurricanes’ defense in his series, and noticing that it was happening to the Flyers as well.

“Their D… they have the best sticks I’ve ever seen. It was crazy. Some of the plays you’d just be like ‘I can get this through,’ like Slav [Jaccob Slavin] has probably the best stick in the league. I had two Grade-A’s [scoring chances] and they hit his stick and up in the netting. I was like ‘how on earth is that not in the back of the net?’”

The length of the Carolina blueliners is causing massive problems for any team trying to play pretty, puck rotation hockey. Throughout the Flyers series we saw the Philly attack get decimated due to deflections from Slavin, K’Andre Miller, and Alexander Nikishin — with their pairings in Jalen Chatfield, Shayne Gostisbehere, and Sean Walker serving more as the more traditional net battlers. This layered defense has been impenetrable in the playoffs and has been offset with the Canes showing more fight and edge that they have previously.

So why is there so much doubt that this can carry over to the cup? There are three fair statements to make:

Forgive the pun, but you can see the storm brewing for Carolina that this incredible run could go south quickly (another pun, sorry). Getting the better of Stützle or Konecny is one thing, but when that caliber of player changes to Nathan McKinnon, Martin Nečas, Nick Suzuki, or Kirill Kaprizov — can this same approach still work? Is there a break point to this defensive dominance where Carolina can be overwhelmed by star players, and if that happens can the Canes recover?

That is the real worry right now, and it’s fair to question what is happening with the Carolina top line. The heroes of the playoffs thus far for the Canes has been the Hall/Stankoven/Blake line two, which has been phenomenal — but there has been pronounced quietness from Andrei Svechnikov, Sebastian Aho, and Seth Jarvis on the top line, outside of a few glimmers of magic. We know that historically the NHL playoffs have been won through star power, even by teams like the Panthers who were bruising, but still leaned on Matthew Tkachuk, Sam Bennett, and Brad Marchand to drag them through.

If the Canes can’t get that top-line performance firing then there’s a chance they can’t assert their will on the game, which has a domino effect on the rest of the lines, thereby putting more pressure on the defense to bail the team out.

The biggest questions about the Hurricanes won’t get answered for some time, with Saturday being the earliest their next series can begin. Whether the Sabres or Canadiens come out of the Atlantic, either team will be the best opposition Carolina has faced, with more star power and deeper lines. If the Canes are able to keep up this dominance in the Eastern Conference Finals then we can really talk about their chances to beat the Avs or Wild in the West.

So are the Canes really cup favorites or pretenders? They’re both, and neither, and bizarrely somewhere in the middle. Carolina is a unique Rod Brind’Amour team that approaches hockey in a way no one else does, which means we can’t use the typical yardsticks to measure their potential. It’s all a big guessing game, but that’s what make these playoffs so much fun.

Then there were … 16. Expanded playoff formats across all sports makes that sound far less dramatic, but The Stanley Cup Playoffs are upon us. It has been an incredible season of hockey with young players establishing themselves as the superstars of the future, stunning trades that took us aback, and an Olympic break which was absolutely devoid of any political drama whatsoever.

The field is now set with 13 teams from the USA and three from Canada trying to capture the most difficult prize in team sports. This year everything is up in the air with the Florida Panthers crashing to earth, meaning we will see a new team hoist Lord Stanley’s Cup. Let’s look at the full field and rank them from the most-likely to win it all, to the least.

No. 1: Colorado Avalanche

The President’s Trophy (awarded to the No. 1 regular-season team) has been a serious jinx when it comes to winning the biggest prize in the sport. You have to go back to 2013 to find the last time a team won both the President’s and the Stanley Cup — but I’m not going to let superstition get in the way with this pick.

The Colorado Avalanche are a phenomenal team. Finishing with 54 wins and 116 points they’d have an even more dominant record if not for a late-second injury to Cale Makar that has sidelined him while this team waited for the playoffs to start. Anchored by Nathan McKinnon, the best player in hockey, the Avs have so much high-end talent on their roster that they seem primed for the playoffs.

It’s very difficult to find a discernible weakness here, with Colorado finishing the season with a preposterous +97 goal differential. At this point the only thing stopping them from going all the way to the Stanley Cup Finals appears to be if Makar’s injury lingers, but it shouldn’t — and they are absolutely the favorites to do it all.

No. 2: Carolina Hurricanes

Nobody else in the NHL approaches hockey the same way as the Carolina Hurricanes, which is both their biggest blessing and their worst curse. Coach Rod Brind’Amour’s brand of hockey puts a premium on even, multi-line play without an emphasis on star players. It’s for this reason that superstars often choose to avoid the Canes in free agency, but this team found its missing piece with Nikolaj Ehlers, who moved past a slow start to the season to become the most consistent player on the team.

Boasting SIX 50-point players this season is something few in the league can claim, including the mighty Avs. Carolina is incredibly deep, attacks from seemingly anywhere, but as a result, also lacks the top-end star power often needed to carry a team to the cup. Couple that with incredibly shaky goaltending and we’re left with a very, very good team that’s unquestionably the best in the East — but lacks that x-factor who can put everyone on their back and carry the team in tough game.

The biggest knock on the Stars is that they play in the same conference as the Avalanche. There’s no question Dallas had a great season by finishing with another 100+ point season, but it’s impossible to look at this team and feel just a little bit let down.

Mikko Rantanen has been very good, but a far cry from the 55-goal monster he was in Colorado, scoring netting just 22 on the year. He’s made up for that with his passing, where Wyatt Johnson has been the biggest goal-scoring benefactor, but a lack of solid center play outside of Johnson really makes this team stand out from the field.

Having good center play is absolutely critical in the playoffs, and it’s for this reason that the Stars lag just a little behind. Relying too much on their wings to push the tempo of the game hasn’t been a recipe for success, and it feels like this team is just one puck distributor away from being able to cement themselves as Stanley Cup favorites.

No. 4: Tampa Bay Lightning

The Lightning are more or less the same team they’ve been for several years now. For whatever reason the organization just keeps running it back and trying again, without a lot of adjustments being made to their core. This is fine with the caliber of players Tampa has in Nikita Kucherov, Jake Guentzel, Matthew Hagel, and Andrei Vasilevskiy in net — but beyond those guys the team falls off a cliff.

We’re left with a team in the East that has a higher top-end than some of its competitors, but much weaker depth. That’s more or less the rub on the Lightning and why they fall to 4th in our rankings.

It’s really, really fun to see the Sabres back in the NHL Playoffs for the first time since 2011 and the team has all the trappings of a unit that can continue to build of this season. The core issue is that they’re too young and too inexperienced to be considered high-level contenders quite yet. Playoff hockey might as well be a completely different sport, which tends to chew up teams that aren’t ready for the tactical grind.

It was extremely tempting to put the Sabres above the Lightning considering regular season success, but I think Tampa and Carolina both have the ability to reach down and find a gear the Sabres are still lacking.

The Wild would be higher on this list if not for the division they play in. They have a lot of top-end talent with Kirill Kaprizov, Matt Boldy, and Quinn Hughes — but too often this team relies on stellar netminding to eke out games.

It’s going to be very difficult to grind out games hovering around the league average in goals-for and goals-against when you have to go through the Stars and Avalanche to make it to the cup. This was a big, necessary step forward for the Wild to get off the treadmill from being an easy Wild Card out, but they still lack some line depth to really make a deep run.

The good news is they have a stellar prospect pool coming up, it’s just a touch too early for them.

No. 7: Montreal Canadiens

It’s wonderful that the Canadiens are back in the playoffs. There’s just something special about the Bell Centre being full for playoff hockey, and having another original six legend back in the hunt just makes it all feel more special.

So, with all due respect to Montreal, they’re not ready yet. I’m giving them an outside chance because they are better than several Eastern Conference teams on this list, with a penchant for rising to the occasion, but they’re also average in a lot of key areas like power play, penalty kill, and goals against.

This makes the Habs a little one-dimensional. They have five core players, with the third and fourth lines being a major liability. That makes the Canadiens a team to watch in the future, but not quite yet.

Lack of wing strength (aside from David Pastrňák) is a major weakness for the Bruins who lack those reliable 2nd and 3rd scoring options. In order to win in these playoffs they need stellar play from the defense, and the centers to win their individual battles — which is certainly possible for a game of two, but not in a seven-game series.

Leading up to the playoffs the Bruins lost three straight games to Eastern Conference playoff teams. They were competitive in each game, but it did underscore the weaknesses of this roster, which is still a few pieces away. Another case of it just being a touch too soon, the Bruins have a really strong prospect pool coming down the pipeline.

No. 9: Las Vegas Golden Knights

It isn’t often you see a team fire its coach less than a month before the playoffs when they’re still in the hunt, but making the switch to John Tortorella was a bold move that had huge results down the stretch. The Knights went 7-0-1 with Tortorella as head coach, finally finding the gear that Vegas has been missing this season.

Goal scoring has been the big issue for this team throughout the season, with scoring being down across the board from a year ago. In 2024-25 the Vegas was 5th in the NHL in goals scored, but that fell to 14th this season. This was compounded by also allowing more goals than a year ago, making this just a much weaker team in general. Tortorella could work his magic, but this team is starting to show its age a little.

Utah have been another feel-good story this year with the Mammoth having expansion team success and making the playoffs in just their second season. A team that loves to grind out games with strong forechecking and reliable defense, the team ranked 10th in the NHL this season in both goals allowed and goals scored.

Just making it this far is a major accomplishment. There’s also a very real chance they could win an opening series against the Golden Knights, who are substantially weaker this season than in year’s past. The issue is that eventually the Pacific Division has to face the Central, which is where the Avs, Stars, and Wild are located.

No. 11: Pittsburgh Penguins

You have to be a die-hard Pens hater not to like the romance of Sidney Crosby getting another shot at playoff hockey, which could be one of the last in his career. This is an old team that leans far too much on Crosby to still make things happen at age 38, without enough youth support behind him.

This has more or less been the story of the Penguins for the last several years, as they’ve struggled to build out their roster in a way that can compete consistently. An emotionally-charged opening series against the Flyers will likely lead to the winner facing Carolina in the second round, and it’s near-impossible to see them making it past the Canes.

The Senators found their way into the playoffs as the final wild card in the east and boast a deep roster with a varied attack. The problem putting them any higher is twofold: Firstly, they have substantial goaltending issues that have plagued the team this season, and secondly, they face the Hurricanes in the opening round.

The Oilers are the same team they’ve been for years now. Connor McDavid is arguably the best player in hockey, Leon Draisaitl is a monster, and Evan Bouchard is one of the best offensive blueliners in the game. This team is a mess defensively, and it’s been for a while now. Ranking 25th in goals allowed, Edmonton has to overwhelm on the offensive end to win. With this playoff field it’s just not going to work.

No. 14: Philadelphia Flyers

So much about the Flyers doesn’t make sense. They’re below the league average in goals scored and allowed, their goaltending is inconsistent, and there’s a lot to love about this team — but just not yet. The future is so bright in Philly with Trevor Zegras and Matvei Michkov, but the playoffs are often determined by veteran talent that can even out a roster and bring much-needed stability. That’s something the Flyers lack right now, and it’s tough to see them making a deep run.

This was a building block season for the Ducks that achieved its goals. One of the youngest teams in hockey, there was huge growth from Anaheim’s stars who are in their early 20s, showing incredible promise for the future. This team doesn’t have what it takes to hang in the playoffs hight not, but wait a few years, and with some smart moves this will be a potential Stanley Cup winning team.

No. 16: Los Angeles Kings

The Kings are in because the depth of the west is incredibly weak. I know that sounds harsh, but with a -22 goal differential this season and a roster lacking impact players means they’re going to be eaten alive by the Avalanche in the opening round. It is what it is.