All seven Canadian teams broken down: the good, the bad, the ugly, and what to actually expect from each one this season.
Welcome to the first Saturday night of the NHL’s brand-new 84-game season. The league moved from 82 games to 84 this year and dropped the puck earlier than ever, on Tuesday, Sept. 29. In this country hockey isn’t a hobby. It’s the baseline, and expectations never come down off max.
What a summer it was. Toronto landed a first-overall pick. Ottawa traded its captain. Winnipeg’s MVP goalie refused to show up for work. Edmonton, Toronto and Vancouver all fired their head coaches and brought in Mike Babcock, Jim Hiller and Manny Malhotra.
Tonight’s Canadian games:
- Senators at Maple Leafs (Ottawa’s season opener)
- Canadiens at Penguins
- Flames at Canucks
Here’s our Canadian NHL season preview for all seven teams: the good, the bad, the ugly (and for a few of them, the really ugly), plus what to actually expect.
The Basement: Rebuilding Out West
1. Vancouver Canucks
Last season: 25-49-8, last in the NHL · Coach: Manny Malhotra (first season) · So far: 1-1-0
Nobody expects much from Vancouver, and last season explains why. The Canucks finished dead last, then dropped the maximum number of spots in the draft lottery. Their first two games against Edmonton produced 27 goals and a 1-1 split. That tells you everything: fun to watch, structurally broken.
🟢 The Good: Thirteen goals in two games against the Oilers says the cupboard isn’t bare. Malhotra has them playing fast and loose. Free-agent signing Paul Cotter scored twice in the opener, including the OT winner, and became the first Canuck ever to score a short-handed goal in his team debut. Marco Rossi followed up with two goals and an assist in game two.
🟡 The Bad: Elias Pettersson has four points in two games and passed Bo Horvat for ninth on the franchise goals list. On paper, fine. The tape tells a different story. That 102-point season in 2022-23 looks more like the outlier every year. He leans on the power play, doesn’t drive play at 5-on-5, and too often looks like a passenger instead of a franchise centrepiece.
🔴 The Really Ugly: Complete defensive anarchy. Fourteen goals against in two games is bad. Falling behind 8-2 because Connor McDavid and Kasperi Kapanen scored short-handed breakaway goals 34 seconds apart, on a Vancouver power play, is a disaster. The blue line is a mess and Kevin Lankinen is getting hung out to dry.
🔮 The Expectation: Brief flashes of looking decent, followed by long stretches of brutal hockey. Bottom five is the likeliest landing spot. Bottom 10 is the ceiling.
2. Calgary Flames
Last season: 34-39-9, missed playoffs · Coach: Ryan Huska · So far: 0-1-0
Not much sunshine in southern Alberta either. The Flames missed the playoffs for a fourth straight year and finished last in the NHL in scoring. This is also their 43rd and final season at the Saddledome before they move to Scotia Place in 2027-28. The farewell tour got off to a rough start: Seattle hammered them 6-1 in the last home opener the old barn will ever host.
🟢 The Good: Dustin Wolf is the real deal, and he’s signed through 2033. Zayne Parekh is the exciting future of the blue line, and Calgary paid two first-round picks to get Simon Nemec from New Jersey in June. Two right-shot puck movers to build around isn’t nothing.
🟡 The Bad: The veteran insulation is paper thin. Nazem Kadri is gone, along with Rasmus Andersson, MacKenzie Weegar and Blake Coleman. Mikael Backlund is now the oldest player on the roster, and Jonathan Huberdeau missed the opener with a hip injury. They’ll play hard, but they’re outgunned most nights.
🔴 The Ugly: Goals. They’ll be a season-long chore at 5-on-5. Wolf posted an .899 save percentage carrying the load last year, and if he’s facing 40 shots a night again, the fatigue on a young team is going to pile up fast.
🔮 The Expectation: Minimal movement off the bottom. Calgary is locked into the lottery tier right alongside Vancouver.
The Crossroads
3. Winnipeg Jets
Last season: 35-35-12, missed playoffs · Coach: Scott Arniel · So far: 0-0-1
Two years ago this team won the Presidents’ Trophy. Last season the Jets became just the fifth defending Presidents’ Trophy winner to miss the playoffs. The window isn’t closing. It’s closed.
🟢 The Good: There’s still real talent here. Mark Scheifele had 36 goals and 103 points last year, and Kyle Connor had 39 goals and 92 points. Connor scored in Friday’s opener, making it nine straight seasons with a goal in game one, an NHL record. And here’s an Alberta twist: ex-Oiler Stuart Skinner, signed for two years at $3.75 million a season, has been one of the early bright spots.
🟡 The Bad: The Scheifele rumours are heating up. Sportsnet’s Nick Kypreos reported Montreal is among the teams asking about him. He holds a full no-movement clause until July 2027, so he controls where he goes. The conversation in Winnipeg is about when the selloff starts, not if.
🔴 The Really Ugly: Connor Hellebuyck. The 2025 Hart and Vezina winner went public with his trade request on Aug. 27, then got suspended for not reporting to training camp. He remains suspended indefinitely with the season underway. This is the guy who signed a long-term extension in 2023 to stay a Jet. Now he’s sitting at home, and he’s coming off a career-worst .895 save percentage, which won’t help the trade return.
🔮 The Expectation: The front office trades veterans for picks and prospects as the year goes on. Bottom-10 finish as the rebuild officially takes off.
4. Ottawa Senators
Last season: 44-27-11, swept in the first round · Coach: Travis Green · So far: Opens tonight in Toronto
Ottawa made the playoffs last year, then got swept by eventual Stanley Cup champion Carolina. Then the summer got weird. Brady Tkachuk told the Sens he wasn’t going to re-sign, so they sent him to Florida for four draft picks, three of them first-rounders. Now Travis Green’s group has to find a brand-new identity on the fly.
🟢 The Good: Leadership stability came just in time. Thomas Chabot is the 11th captain in franchise history and the first francophone to wear the C in Ottawa. Jake Sanderson has been cleared for tonight after an injury scare in camp. They also landed William Eklund, who put up 53 points in San Jose last season.
🟡 The Bad: Losing Tkachuk means losing a ton of emotional weight, net-front presence and clutch scoring, and those picks won’t help for years. Circle Oct. 21, when Brady comes back to Ottawa with the Panthers. That building is going to be loud.
🔴 The Ugly: If Tim Stützle or Drake Batherson slump early, the offence could dry up completely. Depth is already being tested, with Artem Zub out to start the year with a knee injury and a long Atlantic grind ahead.
🔮 The Expectation: The ultimate wildcard. Not a Cup team, but they could thrive as underdogs. Expect them in the wild-card fight right through April.
The Pressure Cookers
5. Edmonton Oilers
Last season: 41-30-11, lost in the first round · Coach: Mike Babcock (first season) · So far: 1-0-1
Let’s not pretend last spring didn’t happen. After two straight Cup Final losses to Florida, the Oilers were knocked out in the first round by Anaheim in six games. McDavid finished that series at minus-8, a record low for an Oilers forward in a single playoff series. Kris Knoblauch was fired two weeks later, and Babcock was hired June 23. McDavid’s two-year extension starts this season, so the clock is ticking loud.
🟢 The Good: The offence is still terrifying, with 14 goals in two games. Evan Bouchard became the first defenceman in NHL history with eight points in his first two games of a season. McDavid had a goal and four assists in the 9-7 win in Vancouver. When this group gets rolling, nobody’s structure holds.
🟡 The Bad: The Frederik Andersen gamble. He signed on July 1 as the reigning Stanley Cup champion, on a one-year, $1 million deal that can climb to $2.8 million with bonuses. The Oilers have already announced he’ll be out until at least December, so counting on him before Christmas is wishful thinking. Zach Hyman is also banged up.
🔴 The Really Ugly: The crease is a total disaster. Last December’s Skinner-for-Jarry swap hasn’t fixed anything. Tristan Jarry made just 17 saves in the opening-night loss. Devon Levi, acquired from Buffalo on July 1, made only 15 saves in his debut while Vancouver scored seven. That’s 13 goals against in two games, and meanwhile Skinner is starting in Winnipeg. They need a goalie upgrade. No ifs, ands or buts.
“Fourteen goals in two games, and they still need a goalie.”
🔮 The Expectation: If they trade for a legit No. 1 or get lucky with Andersen’s health, they’re a lock for the conference final. If they stand pat in net, they’re staring at another embarrassing first-round exit.
6. Toronto Maple Leafs
Last season: 28th overall, missed playoffs · Coach: Jim Hiller (first season) · So far: 1-1-0
Full disclosure: I bleed blue and white. With that out of the way, last season was a mess. The Leafs finished 28th and missed the playoffs for the first time in a decade. The whole front office got torn down. John Chayka is the new GM, Hiller is behind the bench, and Mats Sundin is back as a senior adviser.
Then the hockey gods threw us a bone. Toronto won the draft lottery with just 8.5 per cent odds and took Gavin McKenna first overall. Chayka also pulled off a blockbuster for Kirill Marchenko from Columbus the day before the opener and brought in Sergei Bobrovsky.
🟢 The Good: William Nylander has been spectacular. He scored both goals on opening night, the first just 48 seconds in. Auston Matthews is skating noticeably better, with real burst and serious effort tracking back. Easton Cowan had a goal and an assist in the 2-1 win over the Islanders, the first W of the Hiller era.
🟡 The Bad: Matthews looks great, but he’s still not on the scoresheet. The captain needs to pop one quickly to get the weight off his shoulders.
🔴 The Ugly: McKenna arrived with historic hype and has mostly been a ghost so far. His line with John Tavares and Nylander got out-attempted 19-3 against the Islanders. He’s 18 and it’s two games, but Toronto needs him driving play if it wants to scare the elite teams.
🔮 The Expectation: The talent is there to fight for the top of the Atlantic. If old habits creep back in and the kids don’t adjust, it’s a dogfight just to get in. Bobrovsky is expected in net tonight against Ottawa.
7. Montreal Canadiens
Last season: 48-24-10, lost in the Eastern Conference Final · Coach: Martin St. Louis · So far: 1-0-0
The Habs didn’t make a bunch of flashy moves this summer, and they didn’t need to. They put up 106 points, knocked off Tampa Bay and Buffalo, then lost the conference final to Carolina in five games. They were the youngest team to reach that round since the 1993 Habs. They’re not a Cinderella story anymore. They’re a powerhouse.
🟢 The Good: Continuity and confidence. They opened the year with a 3-2 win in Toronto, with Alexandre Carrier scoring the winner and Jakub Dobes making 25 saves. Nick Suzuki, the reigning Selke winner, and Cole Caufield drive the bus. Dobes started every game of last year’s conference final, and the crease is his. Sam Montembeault is back as the backup on a very short leash, while Jacob Fowler starts the year in Laval as the obvious goalie of the future.
🟡 The Bad: Standing pat means betting on the kids to keep improving without hitting a developmental wall. They still don’t have a proven second-line centre. After failing to land Dylan Larkin, they’ve been linked to Scheifele.
🔴 The Ugly: There’s very little margin for error if injuries hit the top six. A long-term injury to Suzuki could wreck their regular-season seeding.
🔮 The Expectation: Legit, terrifying Stanley Cup contenders, even if it physically hurts a Leafs fan to type that. Expect them to battle for the top seed in the Atlantic all season. They’re in Pittsburgh tonight before the home opener against Carolina on Tuesday.
The Canadian Pecking Order
| Rank | Team | The Verdict |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Montreal Canadiens | Battling for the Atlantic crown |
| 2 | Edmonton Oilers | Conference final if they fix the crease |
| 3 | Toronto Maple Leafs | Top of the Atlantic or a dogfight |
| 4 | Ottawa Senators | Wild-card race to the wire |
| 5 | Winnipeg Jets | Selling off, bottom 10 |
| 6 | Calgary Flames | Lottery bound |
| 7 | Vancouver Canucks | Bottom-five finish |
Think I’m wrong? Of course you do. Come yell at us on the 5 For Fighting podcast and let us know where your team lands. Enjoy Saturday night, Canada.