Toronto Maple Leafs: Power Ranking the Top 6 Stanley Cup Contenders

On the Outside Looking In

Before getting onto our top six Stanley Cup Contenders, we should talk about the teams that are just outside the fray.  The teams who could potentially win a Cup, but who are not favorites to do so.

The fun (or maddening) thing about the NHL is that there always seems to be an underdog who overachieves.  This year it was the Dallas Stars.  No one in their right mind had them as a real contender, and yet they made it to the Final, and even pushed it to six games against a far superior opponent.

While there is always a possibility the Stars are for real, I highly doubt they will be one of the best teams in the league this year.  They fit in with a bevy of decent, but not elite teams that could do well if everything goes right.

To my mind, Dallas sits outside the top six Cup Contenders with the Edmonton Oilers and St. Louis Blues as the three best non-contenders in the league.  The Oilers have two of the best players in the entire world, but they are both bad defenders, their goalie situation is garbage and they’ve failed to put together a decent blueline.

Still, elite players drive results and the Oilers could do some damage. If I didn’t expect Draisaitl and McDavid to give back most of their gains by being so utterly useless on defense, I would have them higher.

The Blues won the Cup two years ago and always get overrated, but they just lost Alex Pietrangelo and who knows what can be expected of Vladimir Tarasenko at this point?

Another team that is OK but isn’t getting contender status is the Flyers.  You can group them with Pittsburgh, Washington, and maybe even Minnesota (who I think will be better than people think) and the Jets, who I think can get by with their sick forwards as long as their goalie continues to be elite.

So to sum up: While not true contenders, the Oilers, Blues, Stars, Flyers, Penguins, Capitals, Jets and Wild all have a decent enough chance of winning the Cup next year, I just don’t consider them to be among the best of the contenders.

One wildcard team I’ll throw in here is the Sabres.  They have Eichel and Dahlin and if they get any goaltending, that might just be good enough to make it far, or even to win if they get really lucky.