What's the absolute minimum each playoff team has to do for it not to be a disappointing run for them?

[tabness]

Leafs: respect in the handshake line
all other teams: Cup

 

[forsbergavs32]

Are you (OP) a fan of any of these teams? Why would any fan of a recent Cup winner say “Stanley Cup Finals minimum”. That’s unfair. Edit: I see OP is indeed a fan of the Habs. I don’t think that means anything, but damn, I would think fans of recent winners would be a lot more lenient (such as the Avs).

My opinions for each team:

Washington Capitals. Make it to round 2 minimum. They have a relatively recent Cup (2018) and it is a huge surprise that the team has been able to retool so quickly into a top team, after last year.

Toronto Maple Leafs. Make it round 3 minimum. No Leaf fan on this planet wouldn’t say round 3 is a success. Keep in mind this is a fan base that hasn’t seen a round 3 since 2002. We MUST have a Cup to make the pain worth it. But realistically, round 3 would be a huge improvement.

Tampa Bay Lightning. Round 1 competitive minimum. Come on bruv. They were recently a dynasty with three straight finals and two Cups.

Carolina Hurricanes. Stanley Cup Finals minimum. Agreed with you here. They’ve made round 3 a bunch of times. Time to take it to the next step.

Florida Panthers. Very strong effort in round 1 is enough by me. Agreed. Recent cup winner. Two straight finals. Don’t need anything more than a competitive round 1.

Ottawa Senators. Make a series out of round 1. Agreed. But for my mental health, please let the leafs win.

New Jersey Devils. Same as above - give Carolina a strong showing in round 1. Agreed.

Montreal Canadiens. Make it to 5 games. They’re a surprise team with a bright future. Winning even just one game would be a success.

Winnipeg Jets. Round 3 minimum. Agreed. Time for Winnipeg to make the next step.

Vegas Golden Knights. Round 1 minimum. Bruv. Recent cup winner. Made the finals their first year. They don’t need anything beyond round 1.

Dallas Stars. Stanley Cup Finals minimum. I think they need to make the finals because of how often they’ve been eliminated in round 3 recently.

Los Angeles Kings. Eliminate Edmonton and reach round 2. Agreed.

Colorado Avalanche. Make it a competitive round 1. Again, another recent cup winner. The idea that Avs fans would say “finals or bust” is ridiculous.

Edmonton Oilers. My first and only "cup or bust". Agreed. Only way to erase the pain of past year.

Minnesota Wild. Round 2 minimum. Slight disagreement with OP here.

St Louis Blues. Strong showing in round 1 (6 or 7 games). Agreed. Recent cup winner. And they made it into playoffs with a crazy win streak.

As an Avs fan, I personally don’t see thinking Cup or bust is too ridiculous. This is the deepest roster they’ve had since the Cup run and CMac went all in this season reshaping the roster completely to add depth and much better goaltending. He pretty much sold off any futures not nailed down for this run so it’s going to be tough to swing deals going forward to build a deep roster again. So IMO anything not sniffing a Cup is a failure.

 

[Craig Button]

The only acceptable loss for the Leafs is Tampa Bay or Florida.
in round 2 and maybe the Jets in the finals.

Any other team it's a must win

 

[T REX]

Tampa - ECF for sure...some might even say the SCFs...I've mellowed a lot. I was spoiled. Mea culpa. ECFs would be awesome and I think most would agree.

 

[Johnny HFBOARDS]

For Toronto it’s definitely a conference final at minimum.

I'm sure a bunch of us here can chip in for the Playoff Sportsnet package they need for their region.

 

[bobholly39]

I agree with most of what you said except the Jets have a little bit better win history then Toronto does with their core. They have won 3 rounds to Toronto's 1. They've been to a Western Conference Finals with a good chunk of this core in 2018. Schiefele, Connor, Ehlers, Lowry, Tanev, Morrissey and Hellebuyck were all on that team that took out the reigning ?Presidents Trophy winning Predators in the 2nd round. And the majority of this core was around when they took out the Oilers in the 1st round in 2021.

Granted Toronto has more success more recently winning a round in 2023 while the Jets last win was 2021. But I'd say that the Jets core players have had a little bit more success overall in the playoffs.

I expect a Stanley Cup Finals appearence at the bare minimum right now by both cores though.

I don't mean to go into a whole Toronto/Jets comparison here - but I just brought it up because it came up in another thread too and so I had recently looked at the stats. People always tend to focus on Leafs playoff woes (and it's true, they always fail in round 1, which is hilarious if you're not a leaf fan), but in a vacuum, there are other teams who have done worst.

Since 2016-2017 (Matthews' era start), win percentage in playoffs:

LA Kins .273
Wild .303
Chicago .308
New Jersey .353
Calgary .355
Winnipeg .400
Columbus .419
Toronto .421

You're right, Jets made it to round 3 once and not Toronto, and that's probably more important - but still, for win percentage Jets do very bad.

And - if instead of going all the way back to 2017, you only look at the past ~4-5 years, it's even worst in the Jets vs Leafs comparison.

In the end - and sticking to premise of this thread - I think both teams need round 3 or 4 minimum for this not to be a disappointing year. I was a bit easier on Jets, and feel good about my suggestion that Jets need round 3 minimum, whereas Leafs need round 4 minimum for this year to be a success.

 

[bobholly39]

I don't really agree it is finals minimum, but it is absolutely the final 4 and it is a long hard fought series in the ECF.

If the Leafs go out in game 6 or 7 in the ECF I think in retrospect the fanbase would be happy with that progress

I think Leafs are running out of time. Tavares and Marner are free agents....and they haven't done shit with this core for playoff success.

If they make it to round 3 and lose....then what? Do the Leafs believe they can run it back and do better next year? Or is the core going to explode, and they regress? I figure making the actual finals is significant - and is more likely to lead to believing you can run it back/make finals again. A lot of back to back finalists in recent years, including Florida & Tampa from their own division.

The Leafs also haven't made a SCF since 1967, so making it would be a big thing. They've lost in conference finals a lot of times since then.

You're probably right that a strong 6 or 7 games effort in ECF would still be a positive, I just think the bar is slightly higher for Leafs.

The only acceptable loss for the Leafs is Tampa Bay or Florida.
in round 2 and maybe the Jets in the finals.

Any other team it's a must win

Leafs losing to Tampa or Florida would be the absolute worst case scenario for the Leafs in my opinion. I think it would be better for them to lose in round 1 - at least then they'll do major changes to core (especially with their big UFAs) try and change things.

If they lose to Tampa/Florida yet again - it's same shit all over again. Leafs will run it back the next year thinking "this time it'll work".

 

[Daximus]

I don't mean to go into a whole Toronto/Jets comparison here - but I just brought it up because it came up in another thread too and so I had recently looked at the stats. People always tend to focus on Leafs playoff woes (and it's true, they always fail in round 1, which is hilarious if you're not a leaf fan), but in a vacuum, there are other teams who have done worst.

Since 2016-2017 (Matthews' era start), win percentage in playoffs:

LA Kins .273
Wild .303
Chicago .308
New Jersey .353
Calgary .355
Winnipeg .400
Columbus .419
Toronto .421

You're right, Jets made it to round 3 once and not Toronto, and that's probably more important - but still, for win percentage Jets do very bad.

And - if instead of going all the way back to 2017, you only look at the past ~4-5 years, it's even worst in the Jets vs Leafs comparison.

In the end - and sticking to premise of this thread - I think both teams need round 3 or 4 minimum for this not to be a disappointing year. I was a bit easier on Jets, and feel good about my suggestion that Jets need round 3 minimum, whereas Leafs need round 4 minimum for this year to be a success.

I'd say both teams need to make the final for this to not be a dissappointing year. The clock is ticking on both of these cores and they have never looked better.

 

[SUX2BU]

Win

 

[HockeyVirus]

I think Leafs are running out of time. Tavares and Marner are free agents....and they haven't done shit with this core for playoff success.

If they make it to round 3 and lose....then what?

They run it back lol what else do you think? Leafs have no future after 4 or 5 years. But they still have a few pieces coming and guys like Knies and Robertson for the next few years. They have until the end of this current Matthews deal as a window IMO and then it will be very ugly

 

[Hennessy]

For Colorado I'd say it's an appearance in the WCF. They went all in and not going deeper will be a tough pill to swallow.
But really, it's Nichushkin finishing the playoffs with the team, whenever that might be.

 

[The Panther]

The Cup: Florida (defending champs, so...), Vegas (recent champ)
Cup finals: Tampa Bay, Dallas, Edmonton, Toronto, Winnipeg
Third round: Colorado, Washington
Second round: Los Angeles, Carolina, New Jersey, Minnesota
Anything is gravy: Ottawa, Montréal, St. Louis

Edmonton: I mean they heavily overacheived due to an easy route last year...

Not sure what you're smoking but there is no way in hades the Oilers had an "easy route" last year!:
Round 1 opponent - 99 points, 12th overall
Round 2 opponent - 109 points, 7th overall
Round 3 opponent - 113 points, 2nd overall
Round 4 opponent - 110 points, 4th overall

This is actually an "average-to-slightly-more-difficult-than-average" path to the Finals + FInals' opponent. It's the opposite of easy.

I think the Oilers were a bit fortunate to avoid Colorado last year, as I think the Avs would have given Edmonton's goaltending nightmares. (Conversely, I think the Oilers would have easily beaten Vegas last year. This year, maybe a different story...)

 

[The Panther]

The only acceptable loss for the Leafs is Tampa Bay or Florida.
in round 2 and maybe the Jets in the finals.

Any other team it's a must win

After one playoff series win in 21 years (!), don't you think you're setting the bar a bit high...?

 

[voyageur]

For the Jets I think the minimum is win a round.

They were not the winners at the deadline. If Colorado with 2 franchise players to lead the team, Brock Nelson and the potential winners of the Rantanen trade took us out in round 2, it would be bitter, but those NTCs who shunned Winnipeg could at least be seen as a reason the Jets couldn't fly over the Avalanche

St. Louis is a team that could have been on the brink of a retool if Monty didn't come to save the day, with 4 Nations being the turning point of the Blues season.

 

[PainForShane]

Great thread idea.

That said, I do think though that a hard fought series ending in a game 6 or 7 OT loss feels much better than getting swept or whatever the Leafs did against Florida a couple years ago -- another example is the 50-win Blackhawks being swept by Nashville, that sweep forcibly ended that dynasty. So for most teams I don't think it's more than just 'what round did we make it to' -- as much as we clown on the Keefe's handshake line quote there is respect earned from a hard fought series. Anyway:

Cup or Bust: Edmonton
Hard fought Conference final: Colorado, Dallas, Carolina, Florida, Tampa, Winnipeg
Hard fought 2nd round series: Toronto, Vegas, Washington
Hard fought 1st round series: New Jersey, Minnesota, LA
Season already a success, would still be nice to win a game or two: Ottawa, Montreal, STL

***

To me it's absolutely crazy that Dallas and Colorado are playing in the first round and the winner most likely gets to play Winnipeg... And also Tampa / Florida in the 1st round. Should be seeing some good hockey early on

 

[Howboutthempanthers]

Cup or Bust: Winnipeg, Dallas, Edmonton
Third Round: Toronto, Washington, Tampa Bay, Vegas, Colorado
Second Round: Carolina, Florida, Los Angeles, Minnesota,
House Money: Ottawa, Montreal, St.Louis, New Jersey

I have to disagree. If Florida gets to the second round they should have everyone in the lineup and no rust. There will expectations of the finals or a cup.

 

[KingsFan7824]

Washington Capitals. Weren't supposed to be where they are, and Ovechkin already has his Cup, but at this point, how is anything short of a Final run not disappointing?

Toronto Maple Leafs. It's the Leafs. Two huge UFAs. Not exactly a young team anymore. It's at least be in the series for the Cup.

Tampa Bay Lightning. Already done their damage recently, nothing really left to prove, but taking out the Panthers and getting out of the 1st rd again would be something.

Carolina Hurricanes. UFAs all over the place. At least a 2nd rd team 5 of the last 6 years. Another make it to at least the Final team.

Florida Panthers. Just have fun guys.

Ottawa Senators. Learning experience, schmearning experience, but there is a reality to it. Take out the Leafs and drive them into franchise altering moves, that's enough.

New Jersey Devils. Nobody expects anything without Hughes, so, again, take out the Canes and drive them to team altering moves, that's enough.

Montreal Canadiens. Already not disappointed.

Winnipeg Jets. Haven't gotten far recently, but look at the ages. They don't have realistic time to not be disappointed with anything less than a Final run.

Vegas Golden Knights. They're Vegas. Again, nothing short of a Final run.

Dallas Stars. Depending on who is or isn't healthy, but Benn is a UFA, and 3rd rd the last 2 years. Again, Final or bust.

Los Angeles Kings. It's just beating the Oilers. You couldn't let it happen 3 years in a row, you damn sure can't let it happen a 4th time in 4 years. It's like Hartford with Boston and Montreal in the late 80's/early 90's.

Colorado Avalanche. Final or bust.

Edmonton Oilers. At least the Final again or bust.

Minnesota Wild. Take out Vegas, and that's great. Finally have cap space this summer, one more year of Kaprizov at only $9m, so even if you lose to Vegas in 5, just too much dead cap to be sad with anything this season.

St Louis Blues. Since they were sitting 10th in the West a month ago, a solid showing against the Jets is enough.

 

[DigitalBoldy]

Minnesota has to win one at least one round for us to be satisfied!

Retweet

 

[Junohockeyfan]

For the Habs, just taking the opening faceoff is the minimum they need to do to not be disappointing.

 

[bobholly39]

Obviously this is subjective - but in your opinion, what is the absolute minimum each team has to do for it not to be considered a big disappointment for them?

I'll try with my own attempt at this. Please share your own thoughts too.


Washington Capitals. Make it to round 3 minimum. The metro seems pretty wide open this year, so expectations are high. Also - in the Ovechkin era, only once did Washington make it past round 2 - so round 3 seems like a good target. I know Washington already very much exceeded expectations by being a top team (most didn't expect them to make playoffs, let alone win conference), but I think anything short of round 3 is a disappointment.

Toronto Maple Leafs. Stanley Cup Finals minimum. Some might say even round 3 would be a good start, but I disagree. This is a top team, a top core, who has massively underachieved so far in the Matthews/Marner era for playoffs. They are running out of time - you can't just do round 3 and be happy. I almost wanted to say "cup or bust", but I let up - making the finals would be great, anything less would be a disappointment.

Tampa Bay Lightning. Round 3 minimum. A bit unsure about them - on the one hand they won 2 cups (3 finals) with this core, so anything extra is gravy. But the east seems pretty wide open this year, they seem well rested and healthy and itching to win again, so I do think if they don't go far it will be disappointing. I'll settle on round 3 - winning the Atlantic. Anything less is a disappointment.

Carolina Hurricanes. Stanley Cup Finals minimum. This is a team that rarely loses in round 1, yet still always manages to fall short of making it far enough. They've had a strong core, and a good playoff team for a while - it's now or never. I think they need to go to finals and make a run at the cup, or else it would be disappointing.

Florida Panthers. Very strong effort in round 1 is enough by me. I'm not a big Panthers fan and I've made no secret of it, but as cup champions, back to back finalists, and with injuries on top of it - they get a pass from me. I'm sure they want to go all the way again, but if they somehow lose in round 1 while at least making it a really tough round for Tampa (6-7 tough games), I think the fanbase will probably accept it, and simply assume with a long off season they can be back in the mix next year.

Ottawa Senators. Make a series out of round 1. 6 games minimum, preferably 7. If they can at least be a very tough out in round 1, it would be something to build off of and hopefully try to make a better run next year. I think the Senators are simply happy to finally qualify for the playoffs again.

New Jersey Devils. Same as above - give Carolina a strong showing in round 1. With Jack Hughes out, it completely changes expectations. If he had been healthy, I'd have said round 3 minimum, but for now they are definitely underdogs.

Montreal Canadiens. I'm a Habs fan - and certainly hope they do well and actually beat Washington - but in reality, simply giving Capitals a strong showing in round 1 - ideally with the core guys like Suzuki, Caufield - but also Demidov and Hutson - doing well will be great. Like the above teams, extending it to 6 or 7 games is enough.

Winnipeg Jets. Round 3 minimum. I almost want to say finals, but I'll be conservative. Winnipeg has a worst win history than Toronto does with their core in the playoffs. Hellebuyck has not been good either. I think they are in a similar spot to Washington, in that they had a much better season than expected but I personally also don't buy them as a top contender. But due to previous playoff failures, I think round 3 minimum including a strong perfrmance by Hellebuyck is necessary for this playoff not to be a disappointment.

Vegas Golden Knights. Round 3 minimum. The West is crazy strong, and they already won a cup recently - so I'll say if they can make it out of the Pacific it'll be a positive outcome for them.

Dallas Stars. Beat Colorado in round 1. I hesitated with this one, as I think expectations are high in Dallas, but they also have a lot of injuries. So I'll say - simply beating Colorado in round 1 will be a big step, and possibly enough, considering injuries.

Los Angeles Kings. Eliminate Edmonton and reach round 2. I think LA is going to lose in round 1 again, but I would guess simply making it to round 2 would be a positive outcome here. They had a great season, but are likely to face more strong teams in round 2 if they make it, so I'll say simply making round 2 would be good enough to not be disappointing. Obviously losing to Edmonton yet again would be very disappointing in LA.

Colorado Avalanche. This team wants the cup, but I'll be a bit more conservative and say Stanley Cup Finals minimum. They won 3 years ago, and are itching to win again. They're well rested and healthy, and should be a contender. I say anything other than making the finals will be disappointing for them.

Edmonton Oilers. My first and only "cup or bust". With how close to the cup they came last year - it's all that matters. Anything else is a disappointment. I'm not exactly sure how healthy McDavid and Draisaitl are - but I get the sense they are good to go for round 1. I know expectations around the league for Oilers are lower now then they were to start the year, but for Oilers I think it's only the cup that matters. And I think they are going to do it - and win this year.

Minnesota Wild. Strong showing in round 1 (6 or 7 games). They are an underdog in round 1 - winning 1 round or more would be great, but I think simply not getting swept or losing in 5 would be enough to not be too disappointing.

St Louis Blues. Strong showing in round 1 (6 or 7 games). They are an underdog in round 1 - winning 1 round or more would be great, but I think simply not getting swept or losing in 5 would be enough to not be too disappointing.

Let me know if you agree or disagree with the above - and post your own assessments of other teams too.

With round 1 over - I thought I'd see who accomplished what so far.

Eliminated Teams:

Montreal - Mission accomplished. I know they were out in only 5 games, but wow what an intense series it was. If you had watched every game as a hockey fan but somehow without knowing what the score was - not so sure this seems like your usual 5 game loss. Good on the Caps for winning, but for a team who was tied 2nd to last place in conference after 4 nations and who no one even expected in the playoffs, I'd say this is definitely a PASS for them.

Ottawa - This looked back 3 games in lol. But it's a hell of an attempt at a comeback. Game 6....and even within game 6 itself, they tried and battled. The bar was quite low, and it looked like they would fail, but in the end they also get a PASS. Finally in the playoffs, and they can build some momentum going into next year to improve further.

New Jersey. Third straight team who gets a PASS. They pushed it to 2nd OT in game 5. Honestly, without their best player they never really had a chance imo. So, they tried, and battled, but lost. It is what it is - next year with Jack Hughes back expectations should be quite high.

Tampa Bay. Massive FAILURE. Probably the worst team in round 1. Expectations should have been very high. They were obviously facing a powerhouse in Florida as cup champions, but Tampa's core themselves have a winning pedigree, and had a healthy team who should have done a lot better. They never really posed a threat - if anything, this was the least close round 1 series, which is pathetic considering it should have been one of the closest (see Col/Dallas).

St Louis - PASS. This one is a bit tricky. When you're up 3-1 in game 7 with under 2 minutes to go, and lose, is it a pass? I still say yes. They took it to the Jets - President Trophy champions - and came super close to winning. It's disappointing to lose based on where they were in game 7, but overall this is still a pass for overall taking it to game 7, based on expectations going into playoffs. Maybe some Blues fans disagree.

Wild - PASS. Similar as above....they really took it to Vegas for a while, and I'm sure Wild fans are disappointed of constantly losing in round 1, but they simply were not the better team. They made a series out of it, but eventually lost in 6. Based on expectations this is a pass for me, even though it's disappointing for the franchise being out in round 1 again.

KINGS - FAILURE. I had Edmonton as cup favorites, so it's not a shock to me this played out the way it did. But still - LA losing to Oilers in round 1 four years in a row, and after being up 2-0, has to be a massive failure for this organization. I won't be too harsh on them because I think Oilers are simply tough to beat, but it's still a failure.

Colorado - FAILURE, but less so then Tampa. There were 2 crazy strong matchups in round 1, one was FLA/Tampa, and one was this one. And while Tampa choked and were never in it - this was as expected a constant battle between two great teams. Simply put - one of Dallas or Colorado had to lose, and it ended up being Colorado. Colorado battled back from 2-1 and 3-2 series deficit to force game 7, and were up in the 3rd as we all know. Expectations were super high in Colorado - so it's a failure, but in my opinion I wouldn't really blow anything up here - run this series again 10x and they win 50% of the time.

As for round 2 - it's too early to tell depending on how series will play out. But ouf of the teams in round 2:

Dallas - PASS. I said simply beating Colorado in round 1 would be a pass (especially with injuries), and they did. Obviously now that they're in round 2, they want more, as they should, but even if they somehow lost I'd say this was a successful playoffs. Bonus points for Rantanen doing what he did - it should be exciting for Star fans going into next year.

Florida - PASS. After a cup and back to back finals, anything is gravy at this point. I'm sure they want to win the cup again, but even should they lose in round 2, I think it's fine. Lots to build off of for next year to come back and do it agian. Of course - they may win it all again this year too.

Every other team - NO PASS YET. All other teams in round 2 have to reach round 3 minimum, and some even more, for it to be considered a successful run. So far so good, but there's still more to go.

 

[Cup Or Bust]

For Edmonton, nothing else except the Cup will matter at this point. Same as last season.

 

[Ianturnedbull]

Answer:

"Respect in the handshake line."