Neil Paine Sep 23, 2026, 07:00 AM ET Close Neil Paine writes about sports using data and analytics. Previously, he was Sports Editor at Five Thirty Eight. The seasons are changing and the days are getting shorter. That means hockey season is nearly upon us -- and we should be in for a fascinating one in 2026-27.

Going into last season, we wrote that something had to give: Either we would see more of the same after two consecutive Florida Panthers-Edmonton Oilers Stanley Cup Finals, or someone new was finally going to get a chance to break through. Little did we know just how far things would swing away from the familiar. Not only did the two-time defending Cup winner (and three-time defending East champ) Panthers not win again, but they didn't even make the playoffs amid an injury-wrecked campaign.

To help handicap the race before opening night on Tuesday, let's look at my aggregated market-forecast tracker, which normalizes and averages together the odds from multiple different sportsbooks and prediction markets to produce a consensus estimate of each team's chances at the playoffs and the Stanley Cup. Using those numbers, we can sort all 32 teams into six tiers.

Tier 1: The cream of the crop. Florida Panthers 10.5% Cup | 81.6% playoffs. Last season's injury-riddled disaster apparently did little to shake the market's faith in the Panthers' dynasty. There are reasons to think the Panthers can do a classic "gap year" turnaround -- ranging from the offseason acquisition of Brady Tkachuk (uniting with brother Matthew) to the return of Aleksander Barkov from the knee injury that cost him all of 2025-26. Colorado Avalanche 9.8% Cup | 89.9% playoffs. The Avs belong here until proven otherwise, after dominating the regular season essentially wire-to-wire.