Can one of the lower seeds in the playoffs win the Stanley Cup?
Matt Larkin was joined by Steven Ellis to discuss which teams from the lower seeds have the best shot at winning the Stanley Cup this year on the latest episode of Daily Faceoff Live.
Matt Larkin: From our AskDFO inbox questions, this week was a great one. Who from the underdog lower seeds, teams who don’t have home ice in the first round, do you think has the best chance to go all the way? I’m not just talking win a round, I’m talking go all the way and win the cup, baby.
Steven Ellis: Let’s stick with the Tampa theme here, I’m still a believer in Tampa Bay. I know this is not the same strength team of the last couple of years, I know that Toronto is the higher seed here. When it comes to the Lightning and Vasilevskiy in elimination games and his career record when it matters, he can just stand on his head.
Samsonov’s been probably better in some categories this year, they have to make sure he’s fully healthy too, he was a little banged up at the end of the year, I do like that Vasilevskiy is still the guy there. The blue line is a little bit different than last year but Nick Perbix has come in and done a really good job, Victor Hedman was not to the peak of his performance anymore but is still Victor Hedman and can still make life miserable for the Maple Leafs.
And just the matchups that we’ve seen over the last couple of years for these two teams have been excellent so I think Tampa has still got a couple more years of high-quality hockey, they’re not done going to the Cup Final. If any lower seed team can do it this year, that’s my pick.
Matt Larkin: I like the pick, I’m going to go with the team that met them in the Eastern Conference final last year, that’s the New York Rangers. I just think the Rangers have a degree of star power that maybe no one else in the conference has. There’s Igor Shesterkin, Adam Fox, who is at least a real contender to win another Norris Trophy. You have Artemi Panarin, Mika Zibanejad, Patrick Kane, and Vladimir Tarasenko who are now Stanley Cup winners.
The kid line, which is really tough for matchups if you’re going up against that third line. It’s Alexis Lafreniere, Filip Chytil, and Kaapo Kakko. You even have Barclay Goodrow, Stanley Cup champion and clutch player on your fourth line as well as Tyler Motte on the fourth line.
And you have that physical d-core with Jacob Trouba, K’Andre Miller, Ryan Lindgren. This team is just so well rounded. Even though the Devils are a tough matchup I think if they can get past the Devils I pick the Rangers to beat whoever advances between Carolina and the New York Islanders. So I think there’s a strong chance the Rangers get to that final four and after that who knows what happens. But I just think they’re a really deep and well-rounded team even though their analytics don’t always suggest that they’re a perfect team, it didn’t stop them from making a deep run last year when their underlying metrics weren’t great because goaltending is the great equalizer.
I like the Rangers as a Stanley Cup sleeper, if you can even call them a sleeper based on all of the talent they have. But I guess they are a low seed so I get to cheat and pick the New York Rangers.
You can watch the rest of the episode here…