07/01/2023
Vegas/Florida Edition.
Vegas Golden Knights
The Recap.
The Vegas Golden Knights made owner Bill Foley’s vision come true winning the cup in their 6th season. Joining the Oilers as the only teams to win in the expansion era in their first 6 seasons. The team had every piece imaginable to win this championship. The depth at every position shined brighter than their jersey’s. 4 lines of consistency; 12 players with 10+ points, 17 players with 1.00+ points per 60 minutes. Guys that hit; 12 players with 5+ hits per 60. Guys that score; 7 players with 1+ gold per 60 minutes. Guys that can pass; 14 players with 1+ assist per 60 minutes. They were disciplined; with 9 players having more than 0.00 net pen/60. They had leadership in every position. Mark stone, Jack Eichel, Jonathan Marchessault, Riley Smith up front. Alex Pietrangelo, Alec Martinez, Shea Theodore and Mcnabb on the back end. And a plethora of quality netminders, Jonathan Quick, Logan Thompson and Laurent Brossoit along with their 4th string goaltender Adin Hill, their eventual cup winner. This is what championship teams are built like. Yes, they were over the cap. Yes, Mark Stones injury and subsequent return seems awful sus. None of that matters as they have immortalized themselves in becoming the 21st NHL franchise to hoist Lord Stanley’s mug.
The Offseason
You won. You did it. Now what...? Well now you got to do it again. And that is NO easy feat. Only 16 teams in the league's history have managed to repeat as cup champions. The most recent of course being the Tampa Bay Lightning only 3 seasons ago.
In terms of contract status this team is fairly set, they have 2 major free agents in Adin Hill and Ivan Barbashev, but given that the salary for players like Quick and Kessel will not be renewed, this team can easily afford to reup both those players who shined during the cup run.
Health is the primary focus as it is being reported that Mark Stone, despite his amazing post season, is still dealing with a lingering injury and the report goes on to state that not only that but he also might deal with this injury throughout his entire career. That does not bode well for a franchise looking to repeat but as mentioned before this team is no one trick pony; they have tremendous depth.
I am updating this as I am writing this, and the team has traded Reilly Smith to the Penguins for a draft pick, my guess they need to make cap space for the aforementioned players and or other roster moves going forward, Smith was a productive player that also wore a letter in both the regular season and the post season so seeing who and how they replace him is yet to be seen.
The Future
Projecting next seasons success for this team is simple, they should be the front runners to win the division, front runners to win the conference, and challengers for the president's trophy. Regular season success will no longer matter to this franchise. They need another championship to join the other 14 clubs that have more than 1 championship. Eichel will likely have the best season of his career netting 90+ points.
Florida Panthers
The Recap.
A season after winning the presidents trophy and being unceremoniously eliminated in the postseason, The Panthers changed up the core moving out Huberdeau in a blockbuster trade bringing in superstar forward Matthew Tkachuk who helped the team make it all the way to the Stanley Cup Final before being suffocated by the Golden Knights. The Injury list has come out, Tkachuk; broken sternum, Ekblad; broken foot, two separate shoulder separations, and a torn oblique, Bennett; range of motion injury and more. This team was decimated. They should feel no shame. They won the first Final’s game in franchise history, made the final for only the second time. They overcame a 3-1 deficit to the best regular season team of all time. Falling 1 series short should feel like no failure. I look forward to seeing what they have in store in the future.
The Offseason
The Panthers have no first round pick, and no first round pick next season, and no first round pick in 2025. This team has shed and shed draft picks to do what they almost did this season. But the future is going to be dark if this team continues that trend. They can’t simply rely on free agency and trades to get better; they need to start getting some picks in the 1st round and acquire some young talented players. As for contract status however, Givani Smith, Colin White, and Eric Stall are free agents up front, Gudas, Fitzgerald and Stall are free agents on the back end, none of which are looking at any sort of heavy pay and in the case of the Stall brothers, they could possibly be headed to retirement. The team has 10.2 million to work with and need to basically resign Gudas, White, and 3rd string Alex Lyon. They seem like they could run it back, even bring back the Stall brothers if they choose, or go after some other parts to hopefully push them over the top, if Tkachuk doesn’t break his entire body in the Final I think the series looks tremendously different, but I still predicted and think Vegas would have won, but Matthew is a pure playoff player, the kind of player that just wins and wins. As a Flames fan, it pains me that he is this talented in Florida.
The Future
The Future is clear, Bobrovsky was tremendous. He resurrected his status as an elite goaltender and overnight made his 10-million-dollar salary look worth it. With Knight, the heir apparent, locked up at 4.5 million for the same 3 years Bobs is locked up for, the transition will be seamless. Bobs can handle the load for a couple more seasons at least being only 34. Ekblad was a stud in the post season, there were times he looked shaky but outside of that he was a rock. His 7.5 million is well worth it for a few more years. I predict because of how balanced this roster is, defense, forwards and goaltending, that they finish next season as a top 3 in the division. I think that the new changes to the team took time and once they settled the team rolled as they should next season.
