Round 1 of the Stanley Cup Playoffs ended on Sunday night with Montreal’s triumph over Tampa Bay, but Round 2 began on Saturday with Carolina-Philadelphia, and continued on Sunday night with a wild opener between Colorado and Minnesota.
The opening round was a thrilling one for hockey fans, so just before we pivot entirely into our coverage of Round 2 and beyond, here’s one last look back at Round 1 with some things we learned out of the gate.
Having a second goalie is more important than ever
Take a look around at the eight teams still standing. Which of them has a clearly defined No. 1 goalie?
Buffalo: Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen is the starter on paper, but split starts with Alex Lyon this season. Luukkonen started the first two games of the Bruins series, but after allowing seven goals Buffalo pulled him in Game 2, and turned to Lyon. Now Lyon, 33, has a 3-1 record and a .955 save percentage in these playoffs.
Montreal: Samuel Montembeault was the Canadiens’ starter when the season began, but a rough start saw him lose grip on the job by December. Jakub Dobes, a 24-year-old backup who played 16 games last season, stepped in. He had hot-and-cold stretches in the middle of the season, too but gained momentum down the stretch. In these playoffs, he has been Montreal’s no-doubt starting goaltender, a development few saw coming back in October. But if he does need to be replaced for any reason, 21-year-old Jacob Fowler is the guy after an extremely promising first 17 games in the league.
Carolina: The three-headed beast. Pyotr Kochetkov and Frederik Andersen figured to split the starts for a third year in a row, but the 26-year-old Russian would have the inside track to get more starts and be the playoff No. 1. However, Kochetkov was injured in the pre-season, got four starts in November, and then was ruled out “probably” for the season in December. Third-stringer waiver pickup Brandon Bussi was given a shot after Andersen became injured as well and he immediately got so hot the Canes extended his contract past this season. However, Bussi cooled off significantly after the Olympic break, so Andersen has taken over the playoff starts and leads the league with a .961 save percentage so far. Kochetkov is available again and Bussi is the backup.
Philadelphia: Prior to this season Dan Vladar had a career high of 30 games in a single NHL season, which he played in last season with Calgary. This year, he was one of 18 goalies with at least 50 starts. Of the remaining goalies in the playoffs, Vladar’s 52 regular-season starts are second only to Anaheim’s Lukas Dostal (55). Vladar, surprisingly, is one of the few no-doubt No. 1s left in the playoffs, but he’s not someone anyone would have presumed would be in this position back in September. Samuel Ersson is Vladar’s backup.
Colorado: Last season the Avalanche made two trades to re-work their goalie tandem. MacKenzie Blackwood started the most games and had a great year, while backup Scott Wedgewood also put up strong numbers. And in the 2025 playoffs, Blackwood started every one of their seven games. This season, Wedgewood got the majority of starts and was statistically the better goalie of the two. Perhaps he should have gotten more Vezina Trophy attention. In the 2026 playoffs, Wedgewood has started every game. Colorado won its first game of the second round in a crazy 9-6 contest, but if the 33-year-old did have a short run of cooler play, Blackwood is still a tremendous option to turn to in a pinch.
Minnesota: Filip Gustavsson started 49 games to Jesper Wallstedt’s 33 and was above Wallstedt on Sweden’s depth chart at the Olympics. In fact, Wallstedt was a trade candidate at the deadline if the Wild were to find a significant roster upgrade elsewhere. But after running cold in the middle part of the season, Wallstedt got red hot after the Olympics and had far better results in Minnesota’s last 25 games. He’s started all seven of Minnesota’s playoff games now — if the Wild want to turn to their other goalie, they’d be turning back to someone who was their No. 1 all season.
Vegas: Injuries really threw the Golden Knights’ goalie mix into a blender this season as none of their three main guys started even 30 games. In fact, Akira Schmid led the way with 29 starts. When Adin Hill returned he started 13 games for Vegas, and won just five with an .872 save percentage. Then Carter Hart returned in April, won all six of his starts, and the Golden Knights rode the hot hand into the playoffs. Now Hart is starting over Vegas’ Stanley Cup winner.
Anaheim: Like Vladar in Philadelphia, Lukas Dostal in Anaheim is their clearly-defined No. 1. This is one that could have been foreseen, given Dostal had started most of Anaheim’s game for the previous two seasons as well. Still, he wasn’t amazing in Round 1 — according to MoneyPuck.com, Dostal has the worst Goals Saved Above Expected of any netminder in the playoffs so far. The Ducks had to replace him early in Game 5 against Edmonton, but turned right back to him in Game 6, where he shut the door for a series win.
Interestingly, when you look back at recent Stanley Cup champions, almost all of them had a solid starter who everyone would label a “No. 1 NHL goalie.” From Sergei Bobrovsky to Andrei Vasilevskiy and Darcy Kuemper circa 2022. But those types are getting fewer and fewer and it’s more important than ever to have a capable No. 2, or a strong tandem as opposed to leaning on just one guy through thick and thin.
Alex Tuch is becoming a very interesting unrestricted free agent
The upcoming UFA market is not exactly full of top-line, game-changing players. There isn’t one player that you’d consider a “franchise superstar.”
But take a look at Luke Fox’s latest list of UFAs and you’ll see Buffalo’s Alex Tuch at the top. The Sabres couldn’t get him re-signed in-season, but also didn’t trade him at the deadline, keeping him for a very important playoff run. Now they’ve won a playoff series and Tuch’s value keeps going up. Through six playoff games he’s Buffalo’s leading scorer, with all seven of his points coming at even strength.
Now we’re looking at the top winger on the market who surely could chase more than $10 million, or even $10.5 million, on the open market. Buffalo will have to entertain paying that, unless the Syracuse. N.Y., native cuts some slack to stay with an emerging team.
It’s high time to work on effective goal-line technology
Game 4 in the Edmonton-Anaheim series was a crucial turning point when the young Ducks’ overtime win gave them a 3-1 lead. Ryan Poehling’s winning goal brought a tinge of controversy to it because we couldn’t actually see an angle showing the puck completely across the goal line.
The call on the ice was a goal, but were the officials positioned well enough to clearly see it? If the ruling on the ice were different, would it have changed the decision from the Situation Room? Using some common sense, it would appear highly likely the puck did cross the line and, thus, the correct call was made. But in the world of modern sports where baseball uses technology to check balls and strikes, tennis to make correct in/out calls on the line, and soccer to review offsides, the NHL could use its own goal line technology to make the right call without a shadow of a doubt.
But is that technology as easy to implement as it might seem?
“A number of things that make it more difficult to develop a technology that can be relied upon are all the activity that is going on around the net at the time, and the fact that bodies, gloves and sticks — and on occasion pucks — are in the way. Posts are in the way,” NHL deputy commissioner Bill Daly said during an appearance on The Fan Pre-Game on Sportsnet.
“It is difficult to have a definitive technology that sees through all that traffic, even in the form of something embedded in the puck. We haven’t found a fail-proof technology yet.”
There’s another idea floating about that’s far less “high tech” and, instead, is just another coat of paint.
The diameter of an official NHL puck is three inches, so what if there were a second line in the net, three inches behind the goal line? If the flat puck touches that second line, you’d know it’s fully crossed the goal line.
The problem with that idea comes when the puck is on its side, pointing north-south. In that case, the “back” side of the puck would just be hanging over the second line instead of being directly on it, and it wouldn’t be as clear-cut with the net camera if it were actually in or not due to the “parallax angle.”
So this idea isn’t a cure-all solution, but it would help and be a small step in the right direction.
In his interview, Daly went on to explain this wasn’t a “burning issue” with the league and that sometimes mistakes happen in sports (not that this was one).
But what if this happens in Game 7 OT of the Stanley Cup Final?
The team turnover is real
There was a lot of turnover into the playoffs this season. Anaheim got back in after years of rebuilding, along with Utah. Ottawa was a monster when it came to underlying numbers, to the point that even league-average goaltending all regular season could easily have landed them a more favourable first-round matchup. Montreal took another big step forward, and Buffalo snapped a nearly decade-and-a-half long playoff drought.
Now that we’re into Round 2 the Ducks, Sabres and Canadiens all won and look very dangerous — one of Buffalo or Montreal will be in the Eastern Conference final.
There are a lot of heavy favourites left, but the guard is changing and none of the new arrivals are, or were, pushovers.
This has to be Carolina’s season to get through the East
Which brings us to the Carolina Hurricanes, a team that’s been knocking on the Stanley Cup door for every one of Rod Brind’Amour’s seasons behind the bench. Already with a dominant win over Philadelphia in Game 1, the door is wide open for Carolina to finally break through.
To make this related to the Maple Leafs for a quick second: Through all 10 seasons when Toronto appeared to have an open Cup window, two in particular stand out as missed opportunities. In the 2020 bubble, the Leafs still hadn’t won a series in its Core Four era and faced Columbus in Round 1. A perfect chance to break the ice, but they never had a series lead and were shutout in Game 5. And in 2021, Toronto won the North (aka Canadian) division in the regular season, then faced Montreal in Round 1 before they engaged in their rebuild. This was certainly Toronto’s best chance to get to Round 3 — instead they blew a 3-1 series lead and were again ousted in Round 1.
These Canes have had more playoff success than those Leafs. Brind’Amour has led Carolina to three conference finals, but they’ve been blown out in each one.
Without a Florida or a Tampa Bay around anymore, the Canes are the clear favourite, the regular-season winners, and by far the most experienced bunch left in the East. This has to be their season to get through to the final, or else it will look like their biggest missed opportunity.
Dylan Guenther has one of the most team-friendly contracts in the NHL
The Utah Mammoth may have been eliminated in Round 1, but their takeaways should be entirely positive.
Notably, the combination of Dylan Guenther and Logan Cooley were dominant at 5-on-5. When those two were on the ice together, Utah had nearly 67 per cent of the expected goals, over 57 per cent of the shots, and actually outscored Vegas 5-3. The duo will be a lot to handle in the years to come.
Specifically, Guenther has to have one of the best, most team-friendly deals in the entire NHL. Making $7.142 million through the 2032-33 season, the 23-year-old signed this extension in September of 2024 after he had scored 18 goals in 45 games. He scored 27 goals in the last year of his ELC, then hit 40 this season. In the series against Vegas he scored three times — one of which gave Utah a lead, and another that tied a game in the third period.
Consider that Guenther, the ninth-overall pick of the 2021 draft, has basically the same cap hit of second-overall pick Matty Beniers, and that he makes less than 2020 first-overall pick Alexis Lafrenière, two players he’s vastly outperformed early in their careers.
With Guenther under a great contract as their leading sniper, with Clayton Keller and lineman Logan Cooley (who will begin his $10 million AAV contract next season) the Mammoth are in a great spot to keep building from here. Having Guenther locked in to such a great rate for so long will give them a competitive advantage.