The Metropolitan Division ended up being one of the closest divisional races in the NHL last season; just seven points separated the third-place Philadelphia Flyers from the sixth-place New York Islanders at season's end.
At the rate things are going, it could be just as close and a lot more competitive.
My projected Metropolitan Division standings feature a couple surprising predictions and a lot of change in the table. See below for the full preview.
Washington Capitals
My Presidents' Trophy pick this season: the Washington Capitals.
"But why not the Florida Panthers?" "Montreal could be quite good this year." "Why aren't the Avalanche your pick?"
Simply put, Washington had an incredible offseason, building what could very well be the most dangerous offense in the entire league.
The Caps pulled off a sign-and-trade for highly-coveted free agent Alex Tuch while adding Jordan Kyrou from the St Louis Blues and Boone Jenner from their division rivals in the Columbus Blue Jackets. Let's not forget that Alex Ovechkin signed a one-year deal to remain in Washington for the season.
Defensively, Jakob Chychrun is coming off a career year, recording 60 points across 80 games. At the same time, Cole Hutson is set for a promising campaign, having recorded 10 points through his first 14 NHL games last season. If things go his way, he could not only find himself alongside Chychrun on that top line, but he could also be in line for a shot at the Calder Trophy; Hutson has only played one NHL campaign and 11 contests fewer than the 25 game upper limit that determines eligibility.
Further down the Capitals' defensive depth is ex-Oiler Vincent Desharnais; he'll be entering his first year with the team after spending the 2025-26 campaign in San Jose.
Once one adds on the goaltending duo of Logan Thompson and Charlie Lindgren, which was a top-ten unit in the NHL last year, it's easy to see how this Capitals team could end up being the best team in the entire league this season.
Even though the Carolina Hurricanes reside in the Metropolitan Division, the Capitals should earn the better regular-season finish (see my justification below).
Carolina Hurricanes
The Hurricanes might be entering the 2026-27 season as the reigning Stanley Cup champions, but they could be poised for a decline in their regular-season performance.
In putting this piece together, I researched how six teams that went to at least three consecutive Conference Finals or three final four appearances in a recent five-year span fared during the following season. The teams I looked into were the Oilers (2022-2025), the Florida Panthers (2023-2025), the Tampa Bay Lightning (2018-2022), the Pittsburgh Penguins (2013-2017), the Dallas Stars (2023-2025), and the Vegas Golden Knights (2017-2021). Of those six teams, just one (the Penguins) made it to the second round in the following campaign; two of them didn't even make it into the playoffs during the following season.
It remains to be seen if the Hurricanes ever fall victim to that trend, but they have been to three of the last four Eastern Conference Finals.
The roster? Relatively similar to the one they fielded last season minus Frederik Andersen, who is now an Oiler. That said, defenseman Alexander Nikishin is still a restricted free agent, and there is talk about him being moved.
The fact that Seth Jarvis could miss at least the first month should also dampen the Hurricanes' regular-season projections.
But do they need to be the world-beating hockey club they were last April right out the gate? It would be nice, but we have to remember that this is more or less the same team that won it all last spring. They'll find a way into the playoffs and set themselves up for yet another postseason run.
New Jersey Devils
Injuries played their role in keeping the Devils out of the playoffs last season and in 2024.
Simply put, if everyone is healthy, the Devils will be a playoff team.
But even then, their new general manager Sunny Mehta (who helped the Panthers win the Stanley Cup in 2024 and 2025) did well to revamp the roster. Most notably, he brought in Anthony Mantha, who is coming off of a career-year in terms of point-scoring; he recorded 64 points across 81 games with the Penguins last season. He also managed to acquire forwards Luke Evangelista, Jesper Boqvist and Evan Rodrigues to help provide some scoring depth for the Jack Hughes-led offense.
The only major question mark is that of the goaltending. With Jacob Markstrom now in Florida, the Devils' main goaltending options are Jake Allen, who won a Cup with St Louis, and Nico Daws. Allen has had some decent numbers since joining the Devils, but Daws is relatively untested. His numbers over the last two seasons haven't been that bad, but he's only played nine games since the end of the 2023-24 campaign, which saw him record a 3.15 goals against average and a .894 save percentage.
If New Jersey can put together a top-ten scoring unit, they should end the season inside the playoff picture. That is easier said than done given that the Metropolitan Division has sent just three teams to the playoffs in each of the last two seasons, but it seems that the Devils are the best of the teams not named Carolina or Washington.
Pittsburgh Penguins
Are the Penguins as good as last year? Probably not.
Are the Penguins still a playoff team? With Sidney Crosby in tow, absolutely.
Even though the Penguins lost Mantha, Stuart Skinner, and Parker Wotherspoon, they offset those losses by adding Nicholas Robertson, Trevor Van Riemsdyk, and Andrei Kuzmenko. While Kuzmenko's point total has declined since the 2022-23 campaign, when he recorded 74 points in 81 games, the chance to play alongside some of the best players to ever play the game could help his fortunes. At the same time, Robertson is coming off of a 32-point season with the Toronto Maple Leafs.
Since arriving in Pittsburgh, general manager Kyle Dubas has been looking to straddle two eras of Penguins hockey. He knows he has to give Crosby and Co. the best chance at winning one more Stanley Cup while setting the franchise up for a future post-Sid the Kid. The youth is there, and the Egor Chinakov trade was a successful one for Dubas, yielding 36 points and a brand-new three-year contract.
At the same time, Dubas' mission is coming to a head. Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, and Erik Karlsson are going to be free agents next summer, while Kris Letang will become a free agent in the summer of 2028. There is conflicting information about Crosby's future, but Elliotte Friedman did set the stage for a potential-but-right-now-unlikely Karlsson trade to Toronto. At the same time, he has a plethora of young stars that are ready to contribute now.
Let's put a "come back to this later" label on the Penguins. Right now, they seem like a Wild Card team, and that could very well be the floor if they get off to a strong start.
But if the wheels come off? Dubas might have to re-adjust and put franchise cornerstones up for sale.
New York Rangers
Just one year removed from a dreadful 2025-26 campaign, the Rangers are a difficult team to understand.
While the Rangers are still looking to retool and build for the future, they also made moves to make the roster more competitive in the now. They acquired Russian forward, Pavel Dorofeyev from the Vegas Golden Knights to cement the short, medium, and long-term future of their forward group while also adding depth forward Eeli Tolvanen in recent days. Defensively, the Rangers added Sean Durzi via the Vincent Trocheck trade, Marcus Petterson via trade with Vancouver, and younger blue-liners like Alberts Smits and William Trudeau.
Here's the thing: Dorofeyev, Mika Zibanejad, J.T. Miller, and Alexis Lafrenière are the only forwards signed past this season, meaning that the Rangers could trade a lot of their newly-acquired stars . It is worth noting that the Rangers' prospect pool at that position is promising; former Barrie Colts forward Cole Beaudoin was also part of the deal that sent Trocheck to Utah. Jacob Battaglia and Liam Greentree are also part of the Rangers' non-roster pool of forwards.
Defensively, things are a little more sound in terms of contracts. The top-two lines will consist of Durzi, Petterson, Adam Fox, and Vladislav Gavrikov, all of whom are under contract past this season.
Though this Rangers team feels like they're going to be right in-between contention and retooling, we will know right away if they're going to straddle that line or focus on the future and sell towards March.
Of their first 15 games of the season, 12 are either against divisional rivals or playoff teams from last season. They also play eight times at home, which will represent an early opportunity to improve on their home record from last season. Specifically, they started the Madison Square Garden-based portion of their schedule 2-8-1, which included losing each of their first seven home games, but ended up going 12-12-5 the rest of the way. It's also worth noting that they were shut out in each of their first three home games, only recording their first goal of the season on home ice on October 20 against the Minnesota Wild, a full two weeks since the start of the campaign.
The winless portion of the 2-8-1 home record directly contributed to a mere 7-6-1 record after 15 games and a 13-12-2 record after the first two months.
If the Rangers can improve on that early-season home record and their newly-acquired stars can live up to the billing, they should be able to put the retool ahead of schedule. The Rangers might not be a playoff team, but they'll be far closer to the dance than last year.
New York Islanders
After earning the top pick in the 2025 NHL Draft and using it to select defenseman Matthew Schaefer, the Islanders seemed to be on course for a playoff return. But a late-season collapse, which saw them go 9-13-0 in March and April after starting 34-21-5, pushed them outside the playoff picture late in the season. The Islanders ultimately finished eight points outside of the playoffs after controlling a postseason spot for over half the campaign.
This season, the Islanders will have to replicate and improve on that campaign without Anders Lee, who left for Utah during the offseason. Mattias Maccelli is a noteworthy addition, having recorded 39 points in 71 games for the Leafs last season, but the loss of Lee is a devastating one.
Even then, Schaefer is coming off of a strong first season in the league, recording 59 points in 82 games. He'll be joined on the blue line by the likes of Alexander Romanov and Tony DeAngelo.
Offensively, Mathew Barzal and Bo Horvat are expected to lead the way once again, but much of the non-Barzal/Horvat forward core is getting older. Recently-acquired forwards Brayden Schenn and Ondrej Palat are both in their mid-30s, and the same goes for Kyle Palmieri. What else is concerning is that the Isles were 25th in goals for per game, tied for 26th in power play goals, and 30th in power play percentage last year, and that was with Lee.
At best, the aforementioned statistics will be roughly where the Islanders end up offensively. If that happens, don't expect much in the way of progress.
Philadelphia Flyers
It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia?
Yeah right, Rob McElhenney.
Jokes aside, even after a breakthrough 2025-26 campaign, it feels like the Flyers pulled a one step forward, one step back kind of offseason. The Flyers succeeded at getting all their stars locked up to extensions, with one of those players being goaltender Dan Vladar. At the same time, Garnet Hathaway was a necessary casualty after scoring just three points in 66 games last season, and Noel Acciari is a solid steal from the Flyers' biggest rivals. And say what you will about adding Zach Aston-Reese, but he isn't doing much in the way of eating up cap space at the moment.
The big problem? No big moves to reinforce the progress from last season.
One has to give props to the Flyers' front office for trying to take a big swing as seen by their attempt at submitting an offersheet for Anaheim Ducks' star, Leo Carlsson. But they have almost $14 million in cap space to make a major move, and Scott Rogust out at the Broad Street Buzz did propose the possibility that Quinn Hughes ends up in Philly.
But let's assume that the Flyers stick to the roster they have, which would be a somewhat-wise move. Maintaining the likes of Porter Martone, Trevor Zegras, and Matvei Michkov (he might just have a sizeable payday coming next summer), would be the wise move, but that's an automatic L when it comes to an arms race. The Rangers and Devils all loaded up on forward talent, and the Hurricanes and Penguins aren't going anywhere.
That alone is problematic.
Unless they use their cap space to reinforce the roster, expect the Flyers to take a tumble down the standings this season.
Columbus Blue Jackets
The Blue Jackets have now fallen short of a playoff spot in two consecutive seasons.
And it doesn't seem like they're going to improve on that.
Gone is captain Boone Jenner and Mason Marchment, both of whom recorded 30+ points last season, and it seems that Kirill Marchenko could be on the way out. The good news is that Zach Werenski is staying put, but Valeri Nichushkin alone won't fill the gap left by Marchment and Jenner.
Even though I have the Blue Jackets in last place in my division projections, that doesn't guarantee that they're Tank Bowl contenders. After all, Rick Bowness is still the head coach after leading the Jackets to a 21-11-5 record since his arrival. It's also worth noting that just two teams in the Eastern Conference finished below .500 last season and that the conference as a whole could still be just as good this season.
Expect another positive season for Columbus in terms of their place in the playoff race, but they'll probably end up falling a few spots in the division.
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