Welcome to part one of my four part 2021-22 NHL Preview/Predictions Series. We’re starting with the Atlantic Division here, and then there will be three more posts here on the site on each of the other divisions, including some award picks in the final one. For each division, I’m going team by team based on how I project each team to finish, starting from the projected winner to the projected 8th-place team. For each team, there will be one or two bullet points giving my general thoughts, followed by my pick of the “X-Factor” for each team (basically the player who could swing the team/franchise’s trajectory the most), and then my prediction on how the season will go, which I guarantee will be 100% correct. If it’s not, feel free to cyberbully me on Twitter in May.
1. Tampa Bay Lightning
General Thoughts: The back-to-back champs have the best roster in the NHL for something like the fourth straight year, though the gap has shrunk by a considerable margin in the offseason due to the salary cap (after all, that’s what it was intended to do). They’re really going to miss that Goodrow-Gourde-Coleman line, which was so crucial to how they closed games out and put pressure on opponents. That said, fully healthy seasons from Hedman and Kucherov will give them a boost, and the firepower they have up front, combined with a still-rock solid defense and having the ultimate playoff assassin in net (Andrei Vasilevskiy), is tough to beat. Their PP can murder you with weapons at all five positions and the Bolts still possess a top 5-10 player in the league at wing, center, defense, and goalie. The stars are here, but the depth is a bit worse than last year. If anything, their biggest challenge will not be any individual team, it will be history, which I’ll explain shortly.
X-Factor: Draw any of the following names out of a hat: Taylor Raddysh, Ross Colton, and Mathieu Joseph. All are young players who the Lightning need to help form their next great third line, after they got priced out of the Gourde/Coleman/Goodrow tier. Can this crop provide depth scoring? TBD.
My 100% Correct Prognostication: Here’s the history component I was talking about. No team coming off 2+ consecutive Stanley Cup wins since the 1984 Islanders has made it past the second round. And of course, you will say that the Lightning are a fabulous franchise with star players, but you could say the same about the 1986 Oilers, the 1989 Oilers, the 1993 Penguins, the 1999 Red Wings, and the 2018 Penguins, and all five squads lost before reaching the conference finals. It’s really, really hard to win three in a row in this modern league of parity. The games pile up and you end up playing so much more hockey than any other squad, a problem that will be exacerbated for Tampa with the last two postseasons being condensed. Given that the Lightning would likely have to beat 3-4 elite teams to win the Cup, given that they play in the Atlantic Division, I just don’t see it happening. I think it’ll be another damn good regular season, but like those other teams before them, they run out of steam in the second round.
107 points, lose in the second round
2. Toronto Maple Leafs
General Thoughts: AAHHHH. Writing anything nice about the Maple Leafs after what happened in May is a crime against humanity and can get you tried at The Hague, but this should be a really, really good team. Narrow-minded fans who like The Narrative focus on what happened over three games spanning five days and ignore that this was the second best xGF% team in the league last season and dominated the division that ended up producing ½ of the Stanley Cup Final wire to wire. Last season was the first truly great Toronto team of the Matthews era IMO, the first without gaping defensive problems such as giving Nikita Zaitsev key minutes. They have two defensive pairs that were >54% xGF% at even strength last season and two forward pairs that were >58% xGF% at even strength last year no matter who their third wheel was. That’s pretty much the definition of a legit championship contender.
Losing Zach Hyman hurts, but I love the Michael Bunting signing, and if they can get even 40-50 games out of Ondrej Kaše, that’s one of the steals of the offseason. Nick Ritchie wasn’t a bad buy either, and I am a huge Rasmus Sandin fanboy. Goalie is the biggest area of question to me, but Jack Campbell was fine in the playoffs and is +10.5 GSAx in his last 79 regular season games. Really just a matter of if he can stay healthy. Petr Mrazek didn’t become the Vezina contender that 17-year-old me thought he might, but he’s had three straight positive GSAx seasons and has winning playoff experience. That could be a rock solid 50/50 tandem for a team that struggled with terrible goaltending last year outside of Campbell.
X-Factor: To me it’s Ondrej Kaše. The Leafs got him for barely $1 M because persistent injuries have haunted his career, but if he can stay healthy, that’s a roster-changing player, because Kaše has the potential to drive a possible third scoring line, while providing effective defensive play from the wing. Toronto’s biggest issue last season when they entered the playoffs was depth scoring, which popped up in a major way after their first line got Philip Danault’d and their second line was damaged when its $11 M center took a knee to the head five minutes into Game 1 and was done for the series. I think the possibility of better depth scoring is real with this roster, because I like the upside of Bunting, Kaše, and Ritchie more than hoping for one last gasp of air from The Corpse of Joe Thornton.
My 100% Correct Prognostication: This is the second-best team in the Atlantic, and since I’ve already said I think history dooms Tampa, that should mean that [REDACTED]. The Leafs have a better second line than Boston and a better defensive corps than Florida, while having equivalent goaltending to the B’s and more secure goaltending than the Panthers. They should be the team ready to pounce if the Lightning run out of steam. The optimistic take is that they are the 1995 Red Wings or the 1980 Islanders, ready to move past several seasons of playoff humiliation and finally make a deep run. The pessimistic take is that the choking has sunk in and that this is just who they are. I’m more into data and rational thought than superstition so I lean more towards the former. Logic says that if you build a really good team year after year, eventually the dice roll will go your way. They’re in a good spot for the dice roll to go their way, with a clear top five roster. And so *gasp* *shudder* *screams*
106 points, lose in the Stanley Cup Final
3. Florida Panthers
General Thoughts: From 2011-2014 the Panthers selected Jonathan Huberdeau, Alexander Barkov, and Aaron Ekblad in the draft. At some point, you knew they were going to cobble together a really good team, but no one saw it going that well. Yes, Florida didn’t get out of the first round, but they lost to Tampa and were a top five team in the league all year. They should be pretty darn good this season too. Barkov is one of my favorite players to watch, a wicked collection of talent, and I’m glad to see that they locked him down, a win for a generally irrelevant franchise in a bad market (even if they should be relocated to Quebec City; make it happen, Mr. Bettman). Huberdeau’s a top 10 passer in the league in my book, and adding Sam Reinhart was a terrific trade. The offense should be dynamite again.
If Ekblad’s healthy, they’ve got one of the best top pairs in the league, as I am also Mackenzie Weegar’s #1 fan. My question more has to do with the depth pieces on D and the goaltending. It feels like everything went almost perfect with the lesser-known forwards and defensemen last season, in a way that feels moderately unsustainable. Are Gustav Forsling and Brandon Montour going to be that good again? That bottom four worries me and it just feels like there could be some mean regression… and in net you have the anchor that is Sergei Bobrovsky and then you’re pinning a lot of hope on Spencer Knight. He’s a phenomenal prospect, but they need him to be quite good, right away, if Bob can’t get considerably better.
X-Factor: Bobrovsky. Strip away the albatross contract, and the sentence remains the same: Florida has the shakiest goalie situation of any contender, with a starting netminder who has been below average for three years now. It feels next to impossible to imagine this team coming out of the Atlantic without better goaltending after watching the series vs TBL, whether that’s from Bobrovsky or Knight. Bob has to play better or else you’re asking a kid with 6 career NHL games to save your season.
My 100% Correct Prognostication: I like the Panthers a lot, and think they are a really competitive team. If my projections are correct (which remember, they will be), they’d face Toronto in an incredible first round matchup that would pit the two franchises who have gone the longest without a series win. In that kind of matchup, it really comes down to the areas I think TOR has the edge: defense and goaltending. Can a Radko Gudas-Gustav Forsling pair be as good as Jake Muzzin and Justin Holl? On paper, I say no. But Coach Q got incredible production out of guys like Forsling, Montour, and even Sam Bennett on offense. Maybe he just does it again.
102 points, lose in first round
4. Boston Bruins
General Thoughts: Boston’s offseason seemed to be the case of people confusing Doing Things with Doing Good Things. The B’s were very active, but I liked very few of their signings. They swapped out David Krejci and Nick Ritchie for Nick Foligno and Erik Haula… that’s a downgrade in my opinion. The loss of Krejci is big, too, even if he wasn’t what he once was. You have to think the Bruins will be shopping their first rounder at the deadline for a center. Boston still has (probably) the NHL’s best singular line in Marchand-Bergeron-Pastrnak, but the depth scoring is a bit questionable. Taylor Hall is a very creative player who will pay dividends on the PP, but who is scoring the goals he creates?
Re-signing Mike Reilly was the correct move, and if they can get better health, Boston should have a really good top four with him + Carlo + Grzelcyk + McAvoy, the latter of whom is a top five defenseman in the league. Didn’t really understand adding Derek Forbort, but that’s an ancillary concern. Goalie is the other area I wonder about. Linus Ullmark posted good SV% numbers in Buffalo, but his GSAx data is rather unflattering. We don’t know if/when Rask is coming back, so you’re betting on him or rookie Jeremy Swayman to get it done in the playoffs. That’s a gamble. My final question is age: Marchand and Bergeron have defied aging curves for years now, but they’re 33 and 36 and decline can come at any time. This team can’t stay a contender if either of those guys slip even the tiniest bit in such a competitive division.
X-Factor: Whatever happened to Jake DeBrusk? He scored 27 goals as a 22-year-old in 2019, saw his pace drop the following season, and then scored just 5 in 41 games last year and landed on the trade block. A good chunk of this is shooting percentage (17% in 2019, 5% last year), but his overall quality of play has slipped a bit too. When I was talking about depth scoring, DeBrusk is the kind of guy who they could really use a big season from. This is his age 25 season, so in theory he should be at his peak. A 30-goal year would be very welcome.
My 100% Prognostication: This is a busy division and it’s hard not to think that Boston has declined a bit since 2019, while Toronto and Florida have gotten better (and Tampa has stayed elite). Losing Chara and Krug has depleted the back-end, their depth forwards have been hollowed out, and it’s tough not having one of the best goalies of his generation in the crease. The Bruins are contenders if their top line continues to find the fountain of youth, the goaltending pleasantly surprises, the defense stays healthy, and they get 1-2 depth forwards to step up. Those are a lot of “ifs” though. Make no mistake, a team with that top line and Charlie McAvoy is going to be in the playoffs, but in this loaded division, I think they’re #4 on the totem pole.
100 points, lose in the first round
5. Montreal Canadiens
General Thoughts: Talk about a disappointing offseason after such a magical postseason run. Philip Danault was the key to that playoff run in my opinion, erasing three straight lines of top-end scorers and now he’s out the door and on to Hollywood. There is no immediate successor for what he could give the team. Christian Dvorak was a decent pickup from Arizona, but he’s not quite the same defensive presence. Letting Jesperi Kotkaniemi go for a first rounder, one that could very much end up in the lottery, was the correct move. Doesn’t make it hurt any less, though. I think their forwards could be pretty good. I’m a fan of Nick Suzuki, Caufield obviously has a high ceiling, and few players are more consistent at scoring goals than Mike Hoffman.
The problem is, within the context of this division, the Habs do not have a player on the same level of a Matthews/Pastrnak/Kucherov/Barkov, and the other top four teams in the Atlantic have at least 2 of those players. Defense is where there could be considerable drop-off in losing Shea Weber. David Savard’s a fine stay-at-home guy, but he’ll have to shoulder a huge load to give them what they lost in Weber’s pseudo-retirement. And of course, the other component to their playoff success was three very good series from Carey Price, who is going to miss time this year. I like Jake Allen, but they’ll need good work from Cayden Primeau.
X-Factor: Alexander Romanov. His rookie season was okay, but not quite what Habs fans had hoped for after his strong career in the KHL/at the WJC. He was scratched for most of the playoffs, and expectations need to be higher for year two. If Montreal wants to really replace Weber, getting better play from Romanov as a sophomore, alongside adding Savard, is the path to doing so.
My 100% Correct Prognostication: The Habs were a firmly .500 team last season and then got hot goaltending, timely scoring, and great defensive play from one forward line to charge deep into the summer. But it’s also worth remembering they were one goal away from being eliminated twice in the first round in either five or six games, which would’ve greatly altered our memory of this team. As always, it’s instructive to take the larger sample size, and 64 games of “decent” outweighs 13 games of “on fire”, especially when the roster got worse in the offseason. Montreal has a shot to make the postseason as a WC, but I think they’re below some of the other teams in the Metro for the 8th spot.
91 points, miss playoffs
6. Ottawa Senators
General Thoughts: There’s a big disconnect right now between the expectations of the Ottawa fanbase and that of the national hockey media. After closing last year 21-16-4 following their catastrophic 2-12-1 start, Sens fans belive that this young core is ready to take the next step. Models disagree. I come down somewhere in between, lower than the fans in Canada’s capital, but higher than some of the Analytics Bros. Tim Stützle is the guy who Ottawa needs to pan out for this team to become a contender. His analytics were grisly in year one but the talent is there: Stützle has a ton of skill and is an electric skater. They need him to have a Jack Hughes-like second year in terms of staying on track to stardom. Brady Tkachuk is on pace to be the most talked about player in Canada whenever Mitch Marner loses that mantle, beloved by Sens fans, but yet to show it in terms of raw stats.
Shane Pinto is a guy I’m intrigued to watch as a rookie, as I think he could be a perfect 3C on a title team. The forwards might not be bad, but I have a lot of questions about the logjam at defense. Why did this team sign Michael Del Zotto? And Nick Holden, for that matter? They have legitimately 9 defenders who could be in the lineup, and it just seems like it’s blocking the path of Erik Brannstrom and Jacob Bernard-Docker, who should be getting a chance to prove it. Not to mention Victor Mete. Finally, the goaltending is a blackhole right now, and until they prove to have a real solution there, I find it hard to take this team seriously as a playoff squad.
X-Factor: Erik Brannstrom is my pick. The Swedish defenseman was the centerpiece of the Mark Stone deal, a highly thought of prospect at the time who just hasn’t made his mark in the NHL yet. I’d love to let him play next to Artem Zub for a season and really see what he can do, but this is a management team that thinks Nikita Zaitsev is a top-end shutdown guy, so I’m not sure I trust their judgement. But in all seriousness, they need Brannstrom to hit, because he and Jake Sanderson could make a perfect future second pair below Thomas Chabot. And obviously, if Brannstrom busts, that’s a major gut punch given that you’d essentially have gotten nothing for an elite winger in his prime.
My 100% Correct Prognostication: Goaltending, goaltending, goaltending. Their projected starter (Matt Murray) posted an .893 last season in 24 games, with a 3.38 GAA. Their backups are young players with little experience and are not considered elite prospects. The defense is breaking young players into the league, and they don’t have a singular elite forward yet. Not ready for prime time, especially in a division as strong as the Atlantic. But I think they beat the projection of a lot of the models.
85 points, miss the playoffs
7. Detroit Red Wings
General Thoughts: The Future Is Starting To Be Now in Hockeytown. After years of toiling away and waiting for the prospects to arrive, they are here, cemented by Lucas Raymond making the opening roster. The former 4th overall pick has looked phenomenal in the preseason and I don’t see why he shouldn’t get a shot to hack it in the league. And of course, they are also adding maybe the best defensive prospect in the NHL to the roster in Moritz Seider. The team also improved in the offseason, adding Alex Nedeljkovic as a potential long-term solution in net, Pius Suter as a sneaky good middle six center pickup, and Nick Leddy as a veteran transition defenseman (though they overpaid for him).
Jakub Vrana’s injury hurts, but you may see this team skate with their last five first rounders prior to 2021 in the lineup this year (Rasmussen, Zadina, Veleno, Seider, Raymond), a marked change from preceding years and finally an enticing reason to put the Wings on your television again. This team won’t be good, but if a few of the young players play well, they could be closer to decent than expected, and certainly more fun than the soul-sucking, no talent trapping style of last season. Would be nice if Tyler Bertuzzi could be a good teammate and make it so he doesn’t have to sit out 20% of the season when the team travels to Canada.
X-Factor: I’m going with Filip Zadina. A potential 40 goal scorer when drafted 6th overall, his analytics have disappointed and he shot just 6% last season despite his shot being the strong point of his game. Zadina has improved as a 200-foot player and if he can bounce back to ~15% shooting while getting to play on a man-advantage potentially being run by a high-end creative talent like Lucas Raymond, there’s a chance he scores 30 goals. Detroit needs Zadina to develop into a top six goal scoring winger, and it’s a pivotal season as the Czech forward turns 22 this campaign.
My 100% Correct Prognostication: The Red Wings have probably passed the bottoming out stage of things and should now be progressing towards competency. This is a house money season where the wins and losses don’t matter much but the progression of individual players absolutely does. Look for them to again be towards the league’s cellar but playing in more competitive hockey games and giving some of the better Atlantic teams a few scares here and there. You’re not a playoff team when you have Marc Staal and Danny DeKeyser in your projected defensive lineup, but playoffs aren’t the goal here: improvement is. I think it happens.
79 points, miss playoffs
8. Buffalo Sabres
General Thoughts: Welp. The Eternal Rebuild soldiers on into Year 11 and this year could be roughhhh. But credit Kevyn Adams for realizing what needed to happen and getting an excellent deal for Rasmus Ristolainen and a less good but still solid deal for Sam Reinhart. Continuing to be engaged in a hostage situation with Jack Eichel is not where the Sabres wanted to be at this stage, but it’s so hard to figure out what’s going on there with the medical details being disputed. At least they haven’t sold low (yet) and given Eichel away for $5 and a bag of Doritos like Rangers fans want. The old core wasn’t cutting it, and Buffalo is doing the right thing by looking for a new core built around Dahlin, Owen Power, Dylan Cozens, Jack Quinn, and they hope Shane Wright.
It’s not clear where the offense is coming from without Eichel and Reinhart. All eyes will be on Casey Mittelstadt and Dylan Cozens to take steps forward, and there were some promising signs under Don Granato. They’re planning on starting Will Butcher, Robert Hagg, and Mark Pysyk on defense… yikes. And that’s before you get to the goalie tandem of Craig Anderson and Dustin Tokarski (lord almighty). I just love that Craig Anderson put off retirement by one more year so he could get the veteran’s minimum to play for the 2021-22 Buffalo Sabres. The man loves hockey, and you just have to respect it.
X-Factor: There are a lot of options here, but let’s talk about Casey Mittelstadt. After a tremendous season at Minnesota had many deeming him the best prospect in the NHL, his pro career has run into many problems. He’s struggled to find a footing in the league and has bounced back and forth from the AHL, leaving the former 8th overall pick’s career on life support at just age 22. However, Mittelstadt had a very strong finish to last season under Don Granato’s “let the dogs off the leash” style of transition offense, 17 points in 28 games after Krueger was fired. The 19% shooting from that stretch is unsustainable, but he looked much better and now he’s in line for #1 center minutes. A 40-point season would do wonders for Mittelstadt’s career trajectory and would be a glimmer of light in a very dark season.
My 100% Correct Prognostication: Yeah, this team is going to be terrible. I think they’ll be better than last year’s 54-point pace, because it’s pretty tough to be that bad without mounds of bad luck, but their tank will go as expected. Pencil Buffalo for the worst record and another high pick in the draft.
67 points, miss playoffs