What does it say about the NHL that there doesn’t seem to be a wide range of Stanley Cup contenders? Sorry, what’s that? ... a pandemic? Which is severely impacting teams’ abilities to add talent, plug holes and refresh their rosters? Must be it! Anyway, here’s how the 31 teams stack up entering the league’s 56-game sprint to the Stanley Cup Playoffs.
Reigning champion
If you’re willing to overlook the fact the Tampa Bay Lightning had to essentially sacrifice Nikita Kucherov’s regular season, scheduling a surgical procedure so that his return timeline would line up exactly with the beginning of the Stanley Cup playoffs, then it really wasn’t a bad offseason for the supposedly capped-out champs.