Top 5 best and top 5 worst NHL teams following January
The five best teams in the NHL have rotated all season long as expected.
5. Tampa Bay Lightning
The Tampa Bay Lightning have been in the previous three Stanley Cup Finals. They lost to the Colorado Avalanche last year but went back to back in 2020 and 2021. They have Hall of Famers all over the place, but it has taken a while to get going this season.
Now, they seem to have it all working again and will certainly be dangerous when the postseason rolls around. Nobody is going to want to play them in the first round because they are going to be a hard out once again. It is good to see them finally crack the top five for the first time in a while.
4. Toronto Maple Leafs
The team that the Tampa Bay Lightning are most likely to play in the first round is the Toronto Maple Leafs. The two teams are going to battle it out for home-ice advantage all season long, but one of the two teams in this top five will be out after the first round, which is kind of a shame.
Auston Matthews is going to be missing for a few weeks because of an injury, but they still have William Nylander, John Tavares, and Mitch Marner playing extremely well right now.
Those guys have earned the right to stay in the top five, as they are good enough to win it all. They just have some demons to get past (the first round). Maybe this is the year.
3. Carolina Hurricanes
The Carolina Hurricanes are sitting at the top of the Metropolitan Division and have stars all over the ice. There is no doubt that they are good enough to win the Stanley Cup and deserve to be considered one of the best teams in the league.
Carolina now has plenty of playoff experience and people on the roster that are hungry to succeed in this league. They also have a coaching advantage over almost everyone that they play against.
2. New Jersey Devils
The New Jersey Devils sit a few points behind the Carolina Hurricanes in the Metropolitan Division but there is just something about them that is more exciting and skillful. Jack Hughes has become one of the best players in the league, and he is leading the way for a very good team.
They are very young and have very little playoff experience, but there is a youthful feel to this team. They also believe that they can beat anybody and have proven it. If they didn’t go through a little bit of a slump in December, they’d be right there in the Presidents’ Trophy race.
They are now one of the best teams in the league again after figuring some things out. They enter the All-Star break/bye week 8-1-1 in their last ten games, and every team in the league should be scared of them in the short and long term.
1. Boston Bruins
Despite losing their last three games, the Boston Bruins are still the best team in the NHL by a wide margin. They have a nine-point lead in the Presidents’ Trophy race still and are going to be the Stanley Cup favorite entering the playoffs.
They have the Vezina Trophy favorite in Linus Ullmark with other superstars like Patrice Bergeron, David Pastrnak, Brad Marchand, and Charlie McAvoy, amongst others.
This is the best team in the league, and nobody should let this slight slump (that certainly included some bad luck) make them think that they won’t bounce back in a big way.