Atlantic Anarchy - Projecting Where All 8 Teams Finish

You could spend hours debating which NHL division is the strongest and still never reach an agreement (trust me I have done it). However, any hockey fan would agree that the Atlantic Division deserves to be in the conversation. With its lower-ranked teams steadily improving and its top teams continuing to dominate, the Atlantic stands out as possibly the best division in the NHL.

1. Boston Bruins

It pains me to put the Bruins at this number 1 spot, but they lost Ullmark (replaced him with a rather decent backup), and Jake Debrusk (replaced by a more-productive Elias Lindholm). On top of those replacements, Boston added Nikita Zadorov to the back end, completing one of the best d-core’s in the league, placing Zadorov alongside Charlie McAvoy, Hampus Lindholm, Brandon Carlo, Mason Lohrei and Andrew Peeke. With the success this team always seems to find, adding a true #1 center (since the departure of Bergeron and Krejci), and a potentially big year from Matthew Poitras, I believe the Bruins will take over the Atlantic this year.  

2. Toronto Maple Leafs

It’s no shock that the Leafs are one of the better regular season teams in the league every year, and no, I’m not trying to make a joke about their lack of playoff success. In the Matthews’ era, the Leafs have, on average, finished 8th overall in the league, proving their ability to dominate throughout all 82 games. I think with Craig Berube now behind the bench the team will experience less scoring lulls during the regular season and come out of the gate ready to play, no longer losing games that they should be in control of from puck drop. I think they have what it takes to beat out everyone below them on this list, but you know they will want to take the #1 seed from Boston. I think that a player like Matthew Knies could be an X-factor, who I expect to take a massive leap with the support of Craig Berube. That, coupled with a much more reliable tandem in Woll and Stolarz, I think that consistency will be the word used to describe the Leafs upcoming season. 

3. Tampa Bay Lightning

For a team that has undergone a fair amount of change, they still have all the weapons and experience you need to be a great team in this league. With Kucherov, Point, Hagel and Guentzel carrying the offensive load for the team, backed up by names like Victor Hedman, Ryan McDonaugh, and Andre Vasilevsky; this team will be just fine finding a playoff spot once again. I am curious if they are able to come out of the gates in-sync with their new additions, but if so, I expect them to outperform a Florida roster that has gotten much worse.

4. Florida Panthers

I’m sure that Florida at 4th is going to have a lot of people disagreeing with my list, but I just think they lost a few too many key pieces this off-season. Names like Ryan Lomberg, Brandon Montour, Oliver Ekman-Larson, Kevin Stenlund, Vladimir Tarasenko & Anthony Stolarz have all departed the Sunshine State. These were key players in the Panthers pursuit of the Stanley Cup, and their absence will be felt, leaving the Panthers a worse team this season then they entered the last. I believe that Tampa has higher end offensive talent than Florida, but similar defense and goaltending, giving the edge to the Bolts. Personally, I think that Kucherov, Point & Guentzel are better than Reinhart, Tkachuk and Verhaege. I guess we will have to see if the Cat’s can prove me wrong, but the roster will just look too different for my liking.

5. Detroit Red Wings

The top of the Atlantic is always stacked, unfortunately pushing a team like Detroit into a race for a wildcard spot year after year. As well, the Yzerplan isn’t playing out the way it was supposed to. Over the past 5 years they have shown (incredibly slow, but) steady improvement, finishing 31st, 27th, 25th, 24th, and then 18th this past season. If this trend is telling us anything, then the Wings could be on track to crack into the top 16 this year - especially with additions like Tarasenko and more reliable goaltending. I struggle to see them finishing higher than any of the teams ahead of them though, hence them sitting at 5th in my predictions.

6. Buffalo Sabres

Buffalo has, by far, one of the best young cores in the league, with Rasmus Dahlin, Tage Thompson, Dylan Cozens, Zach Benson, Jack Quinn, Owen Power, etc. helping this team improve year over year. It still blows my mind that I can’t add Matt Sovoie to that list but, trust Kevyn Adams I guess? Anyways, I do think that this team will improve on last year's performance a touch, but unfortunately I just can’t see them making the playoffs with the NHL’s current playoff structure. Nevertheless, the return of Lindy Ruff will be interesting, and I look forward to seeing if Tage Thompson can get back to his 2022-self. 

7. Ottawa Senators

Year after year, the Senator’s find themselves disappointing their fan base and missing the playoffs, despite finishing the rebuild “years ago” (Sen’s fans, 2020). Will this year be any different? Probably not. Now, they have greatly upgraded the goalie position bringing in Vezina winner Linus Ullmark, along with Leafs’ legend Noah Gregor. Plus, David Perron is a nice depth addition for this team, and I like turning Chychrun into a right defensemen to balance out their 6 spots (although, I do NOT like the value of the return they got). Anyways, I think Buffalo’s rebuild will continue to out-perform Ottawa’s, and Detroit’s improving trend has the Sen’s slotting in behind them for 7th in the Atlantic.

8. Montreal Canadiens

Last, but not least (well kinda least) are the Habs - once again. With Brendan Gallagher ($6,500,000) and Josh Anderson ($5,500,000) taking up a fair amount of the cap space, you would think that their contract situation might be the problem; but with $9,000,000 still in cap space, that clearly isn’t the issue.

Since having Martin St. Louis come in and coach this team, we saw a much more inspired effort from the Hab’s, including Juraj Slafkovsky who found a lot of momentum at the end last year. Until their young guys in Caufield and Slafkovsky can take a major step, including the induction of Reinbacher into the system, this team will struggle to take any major strides. If they can get a big year out of these players, as well as bring in a few veteran-ish players in the summer of 2025, the Canadiens may be able to trend upwards back into a playoff spot in the Atlantic. Names like Carter Verhaege for scoring and Adam Larson to round out the RD position (with Savard off the books that same summer), could make sense, possibly even targeting a goalie like Linus Ullmark, who I fully expect to not stay in Ottawa. Anyways, hopefully the Hab’s can really hit it big on one of their two 2025 first round picks to accelerate and improve this rebuild.