{"id":554387,"date":"2026-04-17T08:39:16","date_gmt":"2026-04-17T08:39:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/554387\/"},"modified":"2026-04-17T08:39:16","modified_gmt":"2026-04-17T08:39:16","slug":"stanley-cup-playoffs-who-are-the-favorites-and-what-to-watch-for","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/554387\/","title":{"rendered":"Stanley Cup Playoffs: Who are the favorites and what to watch for"},"content":{"rendered":"

The field for the Stanley Cup Playoffs<\/a> is set, with the first series set to begin Saturday.<\/p>\n

Six of the 16 teams did not qualify a year ago, including Buffalo, Pittsburgh, Philadelphia and Boston in the East. It\u2019s the 10th time in 12 seasons under the divisional wild card format<\/a> that there have been five or more new teams. <\/p>\n

There will be a new champion<\/a> and no three-peat after the Florida Panthers<\/a> were derailed by injuries following three consecutive trips to the final.<\/p>\n

The regular season runs through Thursday, a day after Eastern Conference teams wrap up. <\/p>\n

Who\u2019s in the playoffs<\/p>\n

WEST: Colorado, Dallas, Minnesota and Utah from the Central Division, and Vegas, Edmonton, Anaheim and Los Angeles from the Pacific. The top-seeded Avalanche have won the Presidents\u2019 Trophy to ensure home ice throughout the playoffs.<\/p>\n

EAST: Carolina, Pittsburgh<\/a> and Philadelphia made it from the Metropolitan, with the Hurricanes earning the conference\u2019s top seed. Buffalo won the Atlantic after the Sabres ended<\/a> their NHL record 14-year postseason drought, and division rivals Montreal, Tampa Bay, Ottawa and Boston also are in.<\/p>\n

The matchups<\/p>\n

The top three teams in each of the four divisions make the playoffs. The other four spots go to the next two highest-placed teams in each conference, regardless of division.<\/p>\n

The teams with the best record in each conference open against the wild-card team with the worst record; the other wild card plays the other division winner. Teams that finish second and third in their division play each other in the bracket headed by their respective division winner. The second round thus carries a higher prospect of division opponents matching up ahead of the conference finals.<\/p>\n

All four rounds of the playoffs are best-of-seven; the first team to 16 victories wins the Stanley Cup.<\/p>\n

The first-round matchups:<\/p>\n

East<\/p>\n

\u2014 Carolina vs. Ottawa<\/p>\n

\u2014 Pittsburgh vs. Philadelphia<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Buffalo vs. Boston<\/p>\n

\u2014 Montreal vs. Tampa Bay<\/p>\n

West<\/p>\n

\u2014 Colorado vs. Los Angeles<\/p>\n

\u2014 Dallas vs. Minnesota<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Vegas vs. Utah<\/p>\n

\u2014 Edmonton vs. Anaheim<\/p>\n

The favorites<\/p>\n

Colorado is the 3-1 favorite to win the Stanley Cup, followed by Carolina and Tampa Bay at 5-1 and Dallas and Vegas at 10-1.<\/p>\n

How to watch<\/p>\n

Every playoff game will be nationally televised in the U.S on an ESPN or Turner network. The NHL schedule is here<\/a> and a streaming guide is here.<\/a> Much of TNT\u2019s coverage, which includes the Stanley Cup Final, will be simulcast on truTV and available on Max\u2019s B\/R Sports Add-On. In Canada, games will be showcased on Sportsnet and CBC.<\/p>\n

After three rounds of seven-game series, the final starts in early June. If the final goes the distance, Game 7 could go as late as June 21.<\/p>\n

Who to watch<\/p>\n

\u2014 Colorado, with MVP candidate Nathan MacKinnon and star defenseman Cale Makar, has been hockey\u2019s best team since October.<\/p>\n

\u2014 Connor McDavid and Edmonton lost in the Cup Final the past two years but are playing better defense and should have Leon Draisaitl for the playoffs.<\/p>\n

\u2014 Tage Thompson was a big part of the U.S. winning Olympic gold<\/a> and the Sabres\u2019 leading scorer finally gets to the postseason.<\/p>\n

\u2014 Nikita Kucherov is right there with MacKinnon and McDavid in the NHL scoring race and has steadied the Lightning through months of injuries. <\/p>\n

\u2014 Philadelphia\u2019s youthful duo of Matvei Michkov and Porter Martone were a big part of the Flyers going from 10 points back in mid-March to making the playoffs for the first time in six years.<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

AP NHL: https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/nhl<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The field for the Stanley Cup Playoffs is set, with the first series set to begin Saturday. Six…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":554388,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5119],"tags":[229,1116,192,155,196,57,5,1326,370,509,2409,231,5281,517,285,4,292,1335,2410,43,14,300,104,39],"class_list":{"0":"post-554387","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nashville-predators","8":"tag-buffalo-sabres","9":"tag-cale-makar","10":"tag-colorado","11":"tag-connor-mcdavid","12":"tag-dallas","13":"tag-florida-panthers","14":"tag-hockey","15":"tag-las-vegas","16":"tag-leon-draisaitl","17":"tag-matvei-michkov","18":"tag-nashville","19":"tag-nashville-predators","20":"tag-nashvillepredators","21":"tag-nathan-mackinnon","22":"tag-national-hockey-league","23":"tag-nhl","24":"tag-nhl-hockey","25":"tag-nikita-kucherov","26":"tag-predators","27":"tag-sports","28":"tag-stanley-cup","29":"tag-stanley-cup-finals","30":"tag-stanley-cup-playoffs","31":"tag-vegas-golden-knights"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116419150714387763","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/554387","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=554387"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/554387\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/554388"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=554387"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=554387"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=554387"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}