Ranking Every NHL Team 3 Weeks Into the 2025-26 Season

Ranking Every NHL Team 3 Weeks Into the 2025-26 Season

All right, welcome back to Cherry Picking episode five of the 202526 NHL season here again obviously with Robert Babiaak. Uh fifth episode of this year so far. Babs, how’s uh how do you think so far the NHL season’s going in your mind? Uh you know, for my Leafs, not great, but for some other teams that I’m up on, I think it’s going well. For the New York Rangers, just so bad. And I I was wrong. They’re a bad team, and I’ll say it. Yeah, you pinpointed the Rangers. That’s interesting. Uh, yeah, Baz brings that up because we will be doing our way too early NHL power rankings for every single team, one all the way to 32. I’m letting you guys know right now, it’s a consensus that Baz and I did. So, there’s some that I totally disagree with Baz, and I’m sure there’s going to be some that he totally disagrees with me, but let’s get right into the video. The first eight. All right, so the top eight we have here, Colorado at number one. Baz and I had them right at number one and two there. And then to round out the eight, we have the Devils and the Capitals. We’ll start with the top three between Colorado, Carolina, and Vegas. I think to start the year, these are the clear three best teams. Yeah, I think Colorado would have even had a better start, but when you’re best goalie is on an AHL conditioning stint, that’s going to be a problem. They’re going to get the rhythm going. Um, but some of their forwards, Nate just unreal start. Really good start. Really, really good. I’m This team is it for me. I They’re my consensus probably the whole year for the for the cup. I would put I would almost edge like Vegas would have an edge on Colorado because um if it wasn’t for the goalie situation because now Aiden Hill’s out also for Vegas and I know they just signed Carter Hart. The guy hasn’t also played hockey in like two to three years. So how good is he actually going to be? And then you’re relying on Akira Schmidt at this point. So Vegas could find themselves falling down the rankings a little bit. Uh the two Stanley Cup or participants from last year, the Edmonton Oilers and the Florida Panthers right there at five and six. Edmonton a little bit disappointing, but you can’t really drop them out of the top five. No, you can’t. Skinner laid an absolute egg to start the year. He didn’t look so great. Now last night it looked okay. Um he’s got to get his rhythm going, but he’s a streaky guy. So they just the streak started at a bad spot for the goalending situation there. So yeah, and then the last two teams at the in the eighth spot or seven and eight spot, excuse me. The Devils have really surprised me. It’s amazing what this team can do when you have a healthy Jack Hughes. Obviously just knocking off the Toronto Maple Leafs. The first time Sheldon Keefe has actually beat the Toronto Maple Leafs since leaving uh as head coach of that team. And then the Capitals, honestly, a team that I think a lot of people imagine were going to regress going into this year just because they had so many guys have such like pretty much career years. Uh, but I think Spencer Carver is just a really good coach. So, if you had to pick one of these two teams to maybe be frauds or let’s just say not frauds, but which team you think would have a is going to have a better finish if you’re looking at it right now? I’m biased because of my Sheldon Keef hate and they beat the Leafs last night, so that just hurt a lot. Uh, it’s probably the Devils. I gotta be honest with you. The Capitals are going to regress, but like they’re not going to be the best team in the East, but like maybe they fall falling down a few spots. Still fits in with what we were kind of saying. It’s within the range. So, I have to say the Devils. It’s mostly out of hate. Okay, fair enough. All right, to round out the top 16 here, we have the Jets. To start off this list, uh the Tampa Bay Lightning at 10 might be surprising for some people because they’re currently last in the Atlantic and had a very tough start, but they were the favorites to win this division at the beginning of the year. So, we’re not going to overreact too soon. No, I think they just had a cold streak to start the season. This this lineup has talent. I love their coach. He’s probably one of the best in the game. He’s a top three coach. They’ll figure it out. Just Yeah, not ideal start, but what can you do? And the team right below them, your Toronto Maple Leafs. I I don’t think there’s any cause for like overreacting at this point. The one thing I would say is you can overreact to is what if Anthony Stolars isn’t like a 2.2 goals against average goalie like he’s been the last two years of his career? What if he’s a 28 guy? How does this Leaf team kind of manage that? They’re hanging him out to dry. Basically, you I said they needed to bring in another top six winger. They haven’t done that. They’ve been trying to fill Mitch Martner’s spot with guys that are really good bottom six guys. My level for concern is they’re the lineup is just it revolves the whole game. I don’t know how they’re going to be able to get a lineup that works super well with Austin Matthews and N. The second line might make sense with Machelli and Tavvarz there, but the first line I can’t make it make sense. Yeah. Like at this rate, if you’re going to just go by who’s producing, Kelly Yan Cro should be on the first line. Yeah, that’s I mean, at this point, you might not have any other option. It seems like Buru is starting to run out of options cuz the EN count project didn’t work. No, good without the puck, but with the puck, he’s like not in he’s just not strong enough. He’s not fast enough. Like there’s a lot of things going against in my mind right now. Um but another team we have that’s I think was projected to kind of break out this year, Utah. And they’ve started to do that. a little bit of a slower start, but just knocked off Colorado in overtime, a team that we both think could make the Stanley Cup finals this year. Is Utah is this going to be the year Utah makes the playoffs? Yeah, and I think they have a really good positive energy going with that team based on the culture they’ve set up right away and the young core that they have. It’s it looks really promising in Utah. So, I expect them to kind of just continue to maintain. Maybe they’ll regress a little bit throughout the year, but they have to be a playoff team in my mind at this point. I I would I would agree with you there. I think Vamela is a really good goalie. I think you’re starting to see a lot of their younger players uh turn into these NHL superstars or goal scorers like Dylan Gunther’s having a really good start to the year. You know, picking up guys like Sergeev last year. I think this team’s really well built. Um and then you look at the next four teams to kind of finish this top 16. You have two teams that have been terrible and now are kind of seeming like they’re going to be on the other side of that in Montreal and Detroit. Then the other side, you have two teams that have been good and playoff teams for the last like four, five years, six years with the Rangers and the Kings, but maybe they’re taking a turn. If you’re looking at Montreal, Detroit, New York, and LA, actually, let’s just start with Montreal, Detroit, and New York. If you had to rank those teams and how they’re how you think they’re going to finish at the end of the season based on how they started, how would you Montreal higher than the rest? I actually had Montreal ranked higher than Toronto on my list. I have a lot of faith and I don’t think this team has in a spot is in a spot to regress. I think they’re in a spot to only get better. Uh it’s an unbelievable roster as a Leaf fan. That pains me to say. Detroit should regress though. I think Detroit might be the worst of the four there. Okay. Some But the New York Rangers also it doesn’t it’s not working very good. So it’s tough. And there the coach doesn’t seem to have a lot of faith in some of the guys. If you look at their shift the amount of shifts players are getting, they’ve got multiple guys in the top 10 for NHL for shifts which shows the coach doesn’t trust guys because otherwise he’d be playing them. Interesting angle there. Coach Babs. Uh, King, I think the team, if I had to hit the panic button on one team out of these four we’re looking at, it would be the Los Angeles Kings. Kopitar’s hurt right now. Uh, but this team just does not look good. And I don’t want to fully point fingers, but I really don’t think Jim Hiller is the right guy for the job. I don’t think he’s a great head coach. You saw like since Tom Mlen’s left, I think this team has progressively gotten worse and there’s so much talent on this team that it’s like inexcusable in my mind. Um, I thought the trades they made were pretty smart considering the direction that this team’s going. But this start has given me zero confidence that anything’s going to change in LA. And for Montreal, I’m a Havs fan, so I don’t want to be too biased. They’ve looked great to start the year, but like they’ve lost to Toronto and New York. And the only teams they’ve beaten other than Detroit, maybe they haven’t beaten anyone. Seattle, uh, they they they knocked off a bunch of teams at home, Nashville in overtime. Uh, they just beat Buffalo at home. So, I’m not sold totally yet on buying in Montreal being this like top 10 NHL team, but I think that what their ranking is on our consensus list is like pretty much perfect. Yeah, the Los Angeles Kings just need to go back to the trap. It worked. There you go. All right. Now, heading over to the trivia portion of the show before we finish the last 16 where Baz and I try to guess goal horns on these different NHL teams. Can’t imagine it’ll go very well. All right, another chairing trivia here in the long form. We got uh I think a hard one today. I think a potentially damn near impossible one today. But we’re gonna do a best of seven series NHL goal horns. Not goal songs, goal horns. Just a big old brass pipes. Yeah. I don’t know. When the Leafs score, I’m screaming. So I don’t even know if I know what theirs is. And I think since you have you have seven of them, Quinn, cuz we’re probably not going to get them on our first guess, like any of them. No. So I think we should have three guesses for each. Yeah, we can do three guesses for each. That’s fine. Are you okay with those terms, Babs? Sure. You have no choice to be honest. Yeah. I mean, I’m just here. Okay. Uh I also am just going to pick randomly out of this list. So, uh here we go. First one. Okay. You can go first if you have a guess. Buffalo Sabres. No. Okay. Oh, Colorado Avalanche. No. [ __ ] Chicago Blackhawks. Nope. Carolina Hurricanes. Carolina Hurricanes. Ryan Surah. What? I was smirking cuz you both said like C teams. You’re Colorado. I was like, “Oh, you’re getting close.” So, ready? Yeah. What the hell? Okay. Go for it. San Jose Sharks. No. Anaheim Ducks. No. You did you figure out where I was going with that? I kind of could have LA Kings. No. Started going deep into his mind palace to find this sound. The Detroit Red Wings? No. The New York Islanders? No. Babs? The Rangers? No, that is all three guesses for both of you. That was the Seattle Kraken. [ __ ] you guys were on the right coast. I was thinking I almost thought I was like I was thinking like, okay, this seems seems this seems like a newer goal horn, like a newer ring. It sounded to me like a boat horn. So, I was like I didn’t I didn’t go Seattle. Ready? Three, two, one. Can I go? We got the Detroit Red Wings. No, I like I have very little read. That one sounded kind of the whole point. That one sounded awesome. It’s a good horn. That’s a good horn. That’s a good horn. Is that the Detroit Red Wings? He just said that. I literally just said that. Let’s go. Chicago Blackhawks. No. The Boston Bruins? No. Oh, could this be? No. That’s a bad guess. That’s a bad guess. The St. Louis Blues. No. Is that three guesses for you? Yeah. Yeah. Last guess, sir. The Florida Panthers. No. This was a team that has been mentioned already. This is the Buffalo Sabres. The Buffalo. That sounds way too That sounds too cool. No, it’s a good And they have a good goal. The problem is they just never get to play it. So that’s not true. Valid. Number three, four, three, whatever this is. Toronto Maple Leafs. No. Okay. Um, that’s what I was thinking. So, this is unfortunate. The Ottawa Sanders. No. The Islanders? No. The Chicago Blackhawks? No. You guys have guessed the same like six teams. The Minnesota Wild. Minnesota Wild. Ryan Sur. That’s two. Ryan. Boom. Just a guessing game of this. No. No. I knew that. Yeah, he’s a huge Wild fan. Okay, here we go. The same one. It’s a long one. It sounds like the exact same. Okay, you go first. You’re losing. Oh, I’m losing the Philadelphia Flyers. No. Is that the Sharks? No. Vegas? No. St. Louis? No. Boston? No. Nashville? No. [ __ ] That is the Washington Capitals. Washington Capitals. I thought the Washington one was louder. Okay, here we go. Montreal Canadians. Montreal Canadians. I was going to say maybe Bavs go first, but No. No. No. There you go. Ryan 3. Babs, you need a generational comeback here. I’ve heard that before, baby. Go. Ryan, you’re going first on this one. Here we go. The longest thing ever. I’m stopping it. Are the Penguins? No. Chicago? No. Is this the Rangers? No. Islanders? No. Dude, you Babs, pick literally any other team than the Blackhawks or Islanders for this next guest, please. The Stars. No, the Leafs. No, the Winnipeg Jets. [ __ ] dude. [ __ ] all these like middle nowhere Canadian teams. All right, Bad, you’re going first on this one. Ready? Yep. There you go. I had to give them one. Okay, now you can’t guess Toronto anymore. Here we go. Isn’t this the Canadians? Nope. Sounds exactly like Canadians. That’s not the Canadians. I’m going to guess a team I haven’t guessed yet. Dallas? No. Going to need an answer. Is it the Detroit? No. Pittsburgh? No. Ryan, last guess. Vegas? No. Is this Boston? No. This the Ottawa Senators cuz they had that stupid stupid thing against the Leaves. We’re still at 3-1. Surah, running out of teams. So, right. I will say the funniest thing to me is all of these teams are all their horns are made by one of two companies and 90% of the league is one company that makes these horns. It’s all the same. The Bruins? No. Detroit? No. LA? No. Pittsburgh? No. St. Louis? No. Anaheim? No. This is the Dallas Stars. [ __ ] this. Okay, ladies and gentlemen, we’re going to call it there. I win. Wins the most impossible quiz ever. All right, this is where it starts to get definitely a little bit diceier. 17 to 24. I think that team at 17 right there, this is one that we definitely disagree on. Like I had the Minnesota Wild at 13 on my list cuz what we’ve seen from them so far this year, they’ve been pretty bad defensively, but that’s something that I feel like John Hines can make up for and turn into something positive. Like it’s just a slow start for I think for them defensively. A little bit of a change on their back end too uh with uh Zev Buham and some of these other younger guys that they’re bringing in, but I think that the Wild are still going to be a top contender and a playoff team. So, I feel like putting them at 17 cuz you had them in like 19 or 20. Yeah. So, when I was doing mine, I I basically balanced uh the power rankings on Money Puck, the standings, and like my own personal view on stuff. There’s teams that are just so far outperforming where I expected them to be at that I had to kind of give them the respect of you’re you’re winning a good amount of high. So, it’s more like there’s just a lot of teams right now that are playing well that you think deserve to be ahead and you don’t want to knock them down. So, you’re just going to knock Minnesota down because they’ve had a slow start. Exactly. Yeah. cuz like the how the [ __ ] are the Pittsburgh Penguins winning games? Yes, a fair enough. And may maybe Dan Muse is a really good coach and he’s been able to figure out and they just needed a switch up from uh from Mike Sullivan. Uh I don’t really know what the answer is there, but we both had Pittsburgh right at 21. I don’t think uh I think that’s a fine ranking for them at this point. I feel like everyone’s like, “Oh, they’re going to finish last. They’re going to be as bad as like the Sharks or Chicago.” But you still have Sydney Crosby and Evani Malcin on a team and Chris Leang. And to be honest, Arterilos has been pretty [ __ ] good to start the year. You got to give them a little bit of credit. Great trade. Yeah. Uh so I don’t think we’re going to disagree on that one, but another one that we might is the Islanders. I had them further down on my list and I watched that game last night against the San Jose Sharks. It was 4-3. They got outshot and outplayed in my opinion. Like they were definitely better at when you play a team like San Jose, like there’s so many opportunities for like high danger chances that San Jose makes up or makes mistakes that you can kind of just counterattack. But I I I still don’t think the Islanders are that great. I do think Matthew Schaefer and Matt Barzal make that team look a hell of a lot better than they are. Uh and Schaefer has looked has exceeded my expectations at this point. Let’s be honest, Skinner had like six shots on that last night for San Jose. Exactly. Like you got like you can’t be doing that against a team like San Jose. You have to be keeping their shot load lower because that’s just Oh, that’s a horrible way I phrase that. But you like the point is the point is true. Uh just not a great uh not a great performance, but are bet on it cash. So there we go. There you go. The plus one and a half did come through. But yeah, I’m still not sold this team. This is a team you had going to the playoffs at the beginning of the year. Still confident in that? I mean, maybe. What do I know? I had New York Rangers coach um Sullivan winning the coach of the year. Coach of the year. So, I don’t know, Jack. And I will say like Ottawa, I think, deserves a little like Ottawa’s has won some good games. They just most obviously just most recently lost to Edmonton in overtime, but before that beat Florida at home. If they were healthy, I probably they would have won more games in push. Brady Brady Kachchuck definitely being out certainly hurts the team, but I think they’re playing well without him right now, too. So, that’s definitely something to look at. And then the Buffalo Sabres and the Predators to round out the 24. Like, I think the Sabres should be way lower on this list. You look at that roster, you you tell me that that’s not a bottom five roster in the NHL. And especially if you take like you look at Rasmosene and Tate Thompson, those two guys are helping that immensely because apart from them, there’s nothing that excites you. Yeah. Like Josh Dome went dummy mode uh which helped. Um, I think by the end of the year we’ll see them at the bottom with Chicago and like some of these other teams like San Jose. But yeah, for now I had Buffalo 28th on my list. So you must have had them in your 21 22. I might have bumped them higher. Like I said, this was very hard for me to decide to basically between the the crap some of the bottom feeders. Yeah. Yeah. And I I wanted to try and give respect to teams that were winning games. Okay, Robert. All right, so the last eight on this list, uh, Columbus is a team I had high hopes for going into the year, but I think you could have expected a little bit of like I don’t want to say regression cuz they’re really young team, but they were so good at home offensively. There was no way they were going to I mean, they’re the second best scoring home team in the NHL last season. I think it was pretty easy to say that wasn’t going to happen again, despite them being a young, exciting team. But again, it goes back to like they’re still not a very good team defensively and they’re going to have to win games 5’4 or 6’5. So, I think Columbus’ ranking isn’t totally unfair, but I could feel like we’ll see them move up as a season. Oh, without a doubt. They’ll they’ll they’ll leap frog teams like Nashville and Buffalo. Yeah, probably Vancouver as well. And then Seattle’s that team that we both thought that was going to have a bad start to the year and they’ve had the complete opposite, beating the likes of Vegas, uh, beating Toronto, having like not a horrible East Coast road trip on usually a team that I would think finishing in the bottom five, an East Coast Road Trip would be like a huge detriment to them, but uh, it seems like they’ve came out they came out of it alive. Like like they came out around 500, I want to say. Yeah. And I looked at like I was looking up some of the players on Money Puck and I’m shocked. Like they’re actually just performing. Yeah. So, like it’s not even like, oh yeah, like you know, they’re just playing so high above expected. Like, no, it’s like just seems like they’ve had just a very good start to the season, but this team will by the end of the year has to be in the bottom. They they continue to play teams like Washington, they’re going to score one or two goals, so they’re going to have to win games 2-1 cuz that offense is just coming from nowhere, especially right now with Jared McCann out. Like, it’s just Seattle is just not a team that you should have any faith in. Yeah, Anaheim, this is [ __ ] Babs, that’s [ __ ] Anaheim is way better than 28th and you know it. Uh, you know what? I had trouble placing at the end of the day. Uh, the I have them 20 on my list. Yeah, because I know their record doesn’t show it. Obviously, a big win against Nashville, but they’re sixth in the NHL and expected goals, four percentage. That’s right in front of Utah, who’s we have 12 on Yeah. They’re just not putting the puck in the net. And also, Crider, uh, it’s a knee injury, so I don’t know what that’s going to say spell for them. Um, this group as the year goes on, yes, probably they will be ranked higher on my list, but I mean, come on. like it it is tough with some of these teams that have been able to win games and perform. Um I really hope that Anaheim has a really fantastic season, but All right. Well, the list didn’t show that kind of confidence, but okay, last question. Who’s the second worst team? Cuz San Jose, I’m sorry, they’re the worst team in the NHL right now. Like, unfortunately, they still don’t have a win. You watch the games, you could tell. They’re really young. They’re inexperienced. They have a lot of Wash players on defense, and a lot of their Wash players that they even would be starting are hurt. Lo Logan’s hurt. Clingberg’s hurt. Um, Shakir Muka Madulan or whatever his last name is, he’s hurt, too, even though he’s a younger guy. Uh, okay. Calgary Flames or Chicago Blackhawks. Who’s the second worst team in the NHL? Ah, god, it’s tough right now. Calgary is not very good. And they’re like they fall in that shift thing where I think they have the top they have three the top three players with the most shifts in the NHL are Calgary Flames players. So, just you dialed in on the shift. I was just looking at shifts and uh a few other things like penalties drawn last night when I was looking at some [ __ ] But, uh, I don’t think the coach has a lot of faith in the team. It’s the same thing I would say with the New York Rangers, just playing the same guys constantly. So, um, upside-wise, I mean, like Chicago’s young pieces, maybe they are going to be a better team by the end of the year over Calgary. I think I think Calgary is easily the second worst team in the NHL at this point. Like, they they’ve lost five or six in a row when we’re recording this video at this point. They play Montreal tonight as we record this, so maybe they get a win. And it’s at home, so maybe Wolfe can do enough to win, but like this lineup gives me zero confidence. the second line like the lines other than the first other than the codri line with like even coding and Coronado there’s nothing really to like about this Calgary team as as mean as that sounds weager and Rasmus Anderson like their defensive unit could be a little bit more exciting but uh I I just I think it’s pretty easy to look at both of these rosters and say Calgary is the worst team right now and they’re probably going to finish worse by the end of the season too. Yeah, and you got like Fabri on your your second line there, and that line doesn’t seem to be producing a significant amount of offense. So, yeah, it’s it’s a tough look. But Chicago, maybe by the end of the year, they’re the fourth worst team in the NHL. Chicago. Yeah. Who do you think’s third? Seattle. It’s probably Seattle. Seattle, Boston. Boston, although at the same time, like, [ __ ] maybe Boston’s going to prove us all wrong. And I know absolutely nothing. They just don’t have enough depth. But like, what the [ __ ] do I know at this point? I’m I’m so just not right. All right, that is uh top 32 of our way too early NHL power rankings. If there’s any complaints you have, direct them at Babs cuz if there’s anything wrong on this list or that looks skewed, it’s because of Babs’ list. And if you want to see Babs’ list, maybe we’ll show you in the next episode as well. Anything to say about that? Be sure to like, comment, subscribe. We’ll see you guys next week.

Three weeks into the 2025-26 NHL season… and Sura and Babs are already overreacting.
In this video, we reveal our way too early NHL power rankings. Who’s for real, who’s fooling us, and who’s already in trouble?

We’re talking surprise starts from the Canadiens, Red Wings, and Utah Mammoth, early panic for the Oilers and Maple Leafs, and everything in between. Look out for our goal horn trivia halfway through the video.

Timestamps
0:51 – 1-16
7:33 – Goal Horn Trivia
13:12 – 17-32

⬇️ Drop your take in the comments — which team are we overrating or underrating right now?

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